White Sands National Monument

Yes, that's snow on the mountains. To get to White Sands from Las Cruces, we travelled over the San Agustin pass at 5,719 ft. We were at the snow level. It was amazing to see snow still left on the ground from two weeks ago and it was 68F outside. The vistas were breathtaking. Once we crested over that pass, the valley opened up with another mountain range in the distance. This entire area is a NASA missile testing area so there's lots of nothing around and gates keeping you out of it. We travelled virtually right to the end of the line before we could even see White Sands. It's amazing that over 200 square miles of gypsum sand dunes could hide until the last second.

They had a Junior Ranger program, so we got the brochure and started working with Yvonne to complete all the tasks. She started on one at Gettysburg and one in Henderson Beach, but never completed them to get the badge and certificate. Well, today she took it very seriously and found all the things in nature to play a Bingo game, she drew an awesome picture of herself sliding down the dunes and a picture of a bird and its tracks. They had a lot about safety in the desert and it was a great learning experience for us all. We bought and then resold a saucer-sled. They sell them for $11 and buy them back for $5. This was the best $6 we've spent in a long time. We all got a chance to fly down a dune and climb back up. We all have sore legs and hips from climbing for a couple hours. We went on two different hikes and were very fortunate to witness a playa with water in it and the gypsum crystals formed that slowly break down and create the sand. At the end of the day, we went in to have the ranger review Yvonne's work and award her Junior Dune Ranger status. She had to do a "repeat after me" pledge to take care of nature, etc. She was very happy to get a cool badge. We're hoping she will now get into doing these things at the National Parks as it's a great way to really learn about the special places we have in North America.