Thither & Yon

Somehow, we did not get a victory selfie, but I DID make it to the top.

Let’s wrap up with some glamour shots of the dunes:

Transcription:

Wednesday, May 12, 2021
GREAT SAND DUNES NATIONAL PARK

Aaaah!! This park is so cool and so infuriating!! The folks at Vermillion Cliffs NM didn’t even know the start of it when they described “demoralizing loose sand.” But, oh! How it’s made up for by the awesomeness of the sheer amount of sand. Of the height of sand. I’ve never seen dunes before, and I am smitten.

On the general advice of my mother and more specific advice of the Park Service, we stopped on our way in to rent a sand sled and sand board. Not just any snow sled or snowboard will do. Sand boards are stiff, lacquered wood planks that come with a chunk of wax for extra speediness. I got lucky #28.

Today was not a warm day. Temperatures eventually tapped out slightly above 60°, but when we arrived at 11:00, it had barely hit my 50°. As I stripped off my shoes to wade across lovely little Medano Creek, I felt nervous about my choice not to wear a jacket on top of long sleeves. The creek was surprisingly pleasant, though, and by the time my toes had dried off as we minced our way through rocky sands towards the dunes, I knew going without was the right choice. In the summer, the sand can get up to 150°. Even on our very mild day, the sand eventually got too hot for me to continue without my shoes, even though wearing them was a giant pain. I just had a little pair of sandals, but somehow they kept getting so full of sand my feet no longer fit.

Before trying [sledding/boarding down] any big dunes, we tried cutting our teeth on some bunny dunes. Good thing, too. I had a serious steering problem and Dustin had an angle problem. I resolved mine with the discovery that trailing my hands on either side allowed me to stay on a straight course. Dustin decided he needed more hill to get his momentum up, so up we went!

Slogging up sand dunes is horrible. There is no getting around it. “Demoralizing” is a word I flung around too lightly, before. It is easier to move around on the dunes if you stick to their crests, but even that isn’t easy. The moment we decided to leave the crest of one dune and make a break directly up to the crest of another? Well, it’s the only time on this trip that I really thought I might give up and go back. “It’s okay if need to you сrу a little,” Dustin said when I caught up to him 2/3 the way up what was probably only 100-foot ascent. I felt weak and broken and furious. It really kind of sucked.

But the views… oh! “Voluptuous,” Dustin pronounced, as we looked down the back side of the dune we’d finally conquered out into a 300-acre sand desert that might as well have been infinite. I have to agree with him. There is something utterly sensuous and unapologetic about the curves and swoops of the dunes. It is mesmerizing.

It’s also nearly impossible to believe how a pile of sand can be so high or so steep. And then the wind kicks up and fills your eyes and hair and ears with sand, and you have some idea, now.

I don’t think we quite made it to High Dune, but I’m pretty sure some sand from there blew over and lodged in my nose. We had to have been on a dune nearly as high, though. My watch reports an elevation gain of 743 feet, and while it certainly has a margin of error, High Dune is currently reported at 699 feet, so we’re definitely in the ballpark.

Time to sled, then! Some of those slopes way up there are wicked steep. I instinctively knew when a slope was too steep. My gut took one look and said, “Nope. Death.” Instead, I chose a nice, harmless-looking, gentle drift from the top of my very high dune to the middle of the next dune over, less than the length of a football field. It was perfect, and wild fun. My freshly waxed sled went SO FAST. Putting my heels into the sand enabled me to stop, which was good because the potential existed to keep going forever.

Dustin had a little more trouble with the sand board. The difference between going nowhere and going the speed of light was razor thin and depended on the texture of the sand. He had a few short but good runs, but [on a sled] I got the much zoomier experience.

A little too zoomy, toward the end. I got a little cocky on the very last leg down and misjudged both the length and incline of the final slope. Also, there were rocks. When I realized this, I tried to pull my hands in, but I’d gotten up to such a speed that I knew if my balance went off even a little I’d end up exactly like Wile E. Coyote, without even a road runner to offer a conciliatory “Meep meep!” I put my hands back in the rocky sand and rode all the way to the bottom, where [having stopped,] I promptly fell off the sled because doing anything else seemed unreasonable.

I honest-to-gravy can’t believe I have any skin left on my fingers, but they are 100% unscathed. I do feel a touch whip-lashy, but I can see so clearly how it could have been worse that I don’t really even mind.

I just can’t get over this place. I am so accustomed to being gentle with National Parks, to being a respectful and careful steward that the notion of having no boundaries is unsettling. There is nothing you can do (powered by your own two feet – no motor vehicles allowed) that the wind won’t simply erase overnight. Hundreds of people running amok, sledding, boarding, stomping out picnic ledges. A few hours later, it’s like no one was ever there. Incredible.

There’s a lot more to this park than the dunes, and while I’d love to come back and explore those other parts, it’s obvious why the dunes are the stars.