Saturday, 13 November 2021
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| today's route |
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| the bigger picture |
On the road
I decided to leave fairly early this morning, not because I hoped to see a lot of animals, but because I hoped to avoid seeing a lot of humans. Today was a Saturday, after all, and I was afraid there'd be a crowd.
I don't think I'd even left the city limits when I came to a sign telling me I was entering White Sands Missile Range (shown in that pinkish color in the lower map above). Another sign said the missile range is "Birthplace of America's Missile and Space Activity." The Army says that title came from 75 years and more than 42,000 rocket and missile tests on "the premier military test range in America."
Another sign said, "When Lights Flash, I-70 Closed - Expect 1 Hour Delay." You can see from the map that White Sands National Monument (now designated a national park) is inside the missile range boundary. The Army and the National Park Service cooperate to allow both sets of activities: the Army gives the park service notice of upcoming tests; the park service shuts down all activities inside the park, including backcountry hikes and camping, for 3 hours to allow the tests, and the park service posts upcoming closures on its website so people can plan ahead. But as the sign above notes, it's not just the park but the entire interstate highway that closes. The highway runs right through the missile range too. Strange set-up.
The missile range was one of the key locations of the Manhattan Project during WWII, and this is where they tested the world's first atomic bomb in 1945. Here's some information about that test, and the aftermath. https://www.nps.gov/trinity-site Robert Oppenheimer, called the Father of the Atomic Bomb, chose the name Trinity for this site, based on his love for John Donne's poetry. Really. Life is full of ironies.
White Sands was changed from a national monument to a national park less than 2 years ago when Pres. Trump signed that year's defense authorization act. There's a brief but interesting explanation of why that was done at this park service page: https://www.nps.gov/news And there's a more thorough, though colloquial, explanation of the differences between the two designations at this page: https://www.orbitz.com/blog/park-vs-monument
White Sands National Park
The entrance is 17 miles from town, so it didn't take us long to get there. The office was closed but I walked the dogs around the parking area for a bit. I saw a water fountain that had a provision for filling water bottles; the park service had put up a bunch of signs warning people there was no water in the park and this was their chance to fill up. I saw a little sparrow flying up to the spigot several times, trying to get a drink, so I ran the water hoping some would collect in the bottom of the fountain. Which it did, and when I looked back, I saw the sparrow comfortably sitting in the bowl drinking from the little puddle that had collected. I felt like I'd done my good deed for the day.
There were also some informational signs around the office. All signs and brochures are at least bilingual; one brochure with safety information is in 8 languages. I've enlarged only the English parts of these signs below.
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| a mammoth - caption enlarged at right |
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| caption from left |
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| a bomb test - caption below right |
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| caption from above left |
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| family playing on the sand - caption below right |
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| caption from above left |
Just before the entrance gate, there was a sign with warnings about rattlesnakes and also saying alcohol is prohibited in the park Feb. 1 through May 31. When I got to the gate, I asked the ranger what happens the rest of the year? Instantly he said, "People get drunk." A comedian. He said the rule is to try to keep down some of the mayhem from Spring Break - there are several colleges in Alamogordo.
White Sands has the distinction of being both the coldest and the wettest desert in North America, and it's the largest gypsum dunefield in the world. Deep layers of gypsum were left behind when the Permian Sea retreated long ago. Unlike other kinds of dunes, gypsum holds in moisture much longer during droughts and, although the dunes are constantly shifting, the moisture they hold keep them from blowing away entirely.
Here are some signs the park service posted along the 8-mile drive through the park.
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| English caption enlarged below |
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| some plants and animals here - English caption enlarged below |
When I first drove in I was disappointed.
Sure I could see white sand dunes, but this didn't look like the sort of thing people would rhapsodize over. But a little farther on, I saw this:
This area seems to have been untouched by humans.
Farther along, we pulled into a picnic area that didn't have other people yet. I wanted to let the dogs walk in the sand - they love beaches usually.
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| I'm looking at this mound of sand straight on - that's how high it is. |
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| The car should give an idea of proportions here. |
It looks so much like snow I had trouble remembering it was sand. And the dogs didn't react as I'd expected. This sand is colder and harder than the usual sand at the beach, and they seemed a little unsettled with it. We climbed up a short slope and walked around a bit, but I wasn't dressed to go cliff-climbing in it, and the dogs had trouble walking in it, so we just went back after a bit.
The park service (and just about everybody else in the area) sells big disks for people to sit on and ride down the dunes - and a whole lot of people were doing just that.
White Sands is so big and so white, astronauts can see it from space.
There's a section of the park called West Filming Area. The rangers told me this is where film crews usually go when they make movies and commercials. Some famous people have filmed here. Here's a bit of information about that. https://www.nps.gov/commercial-filming
This is an amazing place, and what with prehistoric footprints and the general geology of the place, there's a whole lot there that we didn't have time for. The main building wasn't open when we got here, and the parking lot was packed when we left (so I figured the building was too). I'll just have to come back another time when there's not a highly contagious virus raging.
Back to town
As we came into town, we passed a mechanics shop, where a sign said: "Pumpkin Spice Oil Changes Are Back." What on earth do you think these are? Unless (I hope) it's just a joke?
And back to the campground for a couple of days.
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