Day 18 - White Sands National Monument

Day 18

Campsite in Benson, AZ>  White Sands National Monument, NM> Campsite in New Mexico

            So yet another day of driving through the deserts of the United States began.. without A/c I might add. We left the campsite in Arizona setting forth on our drive to White Sands National Monument in New Mexico. The drive was going to be a rather long one so we got our game faces on and headed east through the hottest and driest parts of America. We arrived at White Sands around 5 pm. We had noticed and learned that this area was where they have some much of the major missile testing for the U.S. army…. That doesn’t effect anything we did but it was rather interesting to drive past big army bases in the middle of no where. Anyway, once we arrived at White Sands…. A very special section of desert within a much larger desert we were very excited to get out of the car and into the air-conditioned visitor center. 

We learned that White Sands is made up of Gypsum which has been weathered away into sand and has become an 8 mile long section of pure white sand dunes. This sand is not only very white but it is perpetually cool and thus much easier to walk around on. Well, one of the more popular things to do in White Sands National monument is sledding. Yes… sledding in the desert.

We bought a circle sled and headed for the dunes. We had some fun sliding down the hills for a while, but what was really cool was the sunset and the beginning of night.

The sunset was amazing and the colors were incredible. However, once the moon came up.. and we were fortunate enough to arrive on the night of a full moon…. It was like day time. The light of the moon reflected off of the white sand and light up the ground. We had full shadows at night and it really looked like we were on the surface of the moon. Well the park closed at 10 and they kicked us our, but it was an amazing experience and by far one of the coolest stops on our raodtrip so far. We packed up and found another campsite in New Mexico not to far away. It was a long day of driving and we needed some good rest.