Sand Dunes in the Snow

North America » United States » Colorado » Lamar
October 28th 2006

Published: November 13th 2006

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It was another cool - strike that, cold night… But again the sky was blue and there was barely a cloud to be seen. Perfect for driving, but not so perfect for sightseeing!! Today our objective is the Great Sand Dunes National Park and as many miles as we can manage towards Kechi… The house is scheduled to close on November 1 and we need to remove all the furniture we left in the house to make it more saleable.

Statistics

Starting Destination: Durango, Colorado
Ending Destination: Lamar, Colorado
Ending Destination GPS: N: 38° 05.932’ W: 102° 37.481’ Elev: 3635’
Miles Driven: 395.6
Distance Hiked: 3 miles & 650 feet elevation change +/- a few dunes
Number of Cumulative Crossings of the Continental Divide: 12

Skiing, already!

We got started relatively early, for us… taking a little time to cruise the main street of Durango, Carl remembers visiting the town in the 80’s - things have changed significantly since then! We had considered trying to get up early to view the Durango to Silverton Narrow Gauge Steam Train; but it’s last trip to Silverton for the season was leaving at 8:15am… just a little early for us! We continued out of town towards our first pass for the day; Wolf Creek Pass. We stopped at the base of the mountain, where there was a waterfall; and then half way up where there was a lookout - where we could see back through the valley we had just driven, but we didn’t stop at the site where a truck who had taken one of the downhill corners just a little to fast didn’t make it on all wheels. At the top of the pass we were surprised to see a flat parking area where there were many trucks… Looking further to the right we saw a field full of snowmobiles and air filled with exhaust fumes - but this didn’t prepare us for the packed parking lot of the ski resort just around the corner! We found out later that there had been a very large snow storm a few days previously and everyone was enjoying the results. This pass was our latest crossing of the Continental Divide, we considered stopping for lunch, but our next destination was calling…

Off to the Beach?!..

Our next destination was the Great Sand Dunes. We wound our way down the mountain following the railway line; about half way down we started noticing some flat cars parked on the tracks, the cars went on for miles… they must have been semi-permanent as the chain was broken for each road crossing!! About this time we could see what we thought were the sand dunes peaking over the trees… but, they were really white and we couldn’t figure out why. We kept getting closer and closer as we crossed the valley floor, but the dunes remained white; there was no snow on the ground where we were driving so it didn’t occur to us that it was snow on top of the dunes! We were nearly across the valley before we realized!! Admittedly we were a little distracted about all the signs for real estate - purchase 20 acres of Colorado Land and “build your dream home!” It was not that the 20 acres weren’t “Mountain View,” but that you almost needed a telescope to see the Mountain! But, the most fascinating was looking at the range of “dwellings” that had been constructed. We reached the turn-off to the National Park and stopped to read some of the Informational signs, and it was then that Carl realized the peak we had been driving towards was Blanca Peak and that it wasn’t just a hill - it was over 14,000 feet!

The National Park was only 20 miles North from the main highway, but we had to negotiate some road construction to get there - thankfully there wasn’t much of a delay. Our first stop in the park was the Visitors’ Center, where we collected the park map and took some photos of the dunes. With the sun, the sand and the snow we were not quite sure what setting to use on the camera - Maria decided that she would try the Beach & Snow setting!! The melting snow really added a different dimension to the photos as it created interesting shapes, highlighting the ripples in the sand. The most fascinating information at the visitors’ center was learning about the dunes, how they are created and maintained. In the early 2000’s the park had been enlarged to include parts of the National Forest, the valley floor and the watershed - all these components are needed for maintaining the dunes. It certainly was a sight; sand dunes “perched” right up against the mountains. We looked on the map for walks within the park - there were two kinds: one through the dunes and the others along the mountains. We drove to the start of the walk for the dunes and ate lunch sitting in the parking lot before starting off. We both put on some warm clothes, Carl changed the lens on his camera to the “Big” one and we set off… Carl thinking that we were only walking out a ways and taking some photos, Maria thinking that we would climb the dunes… Needless to say, this caused a little confusion… We walked out to the first dunes, watched people sliding down the slopes on sleds, plastic bags or anything else they thought would work; then spotted several snowball fights, a snow fort and even a sand castle or snow castle or something in between! It was about this time that we realized that weren’t on the same page with respect to our objectives… after some confusion, we decided to proceed towards the peak of “Big Dune,” not the biggest dune, but the one that looks the tallest from the visitors’ center.

The only difficulty being that there is no “trail,” the map basically says “follow the ridges!” So we slogged our way to the top of one ridge, only to find that it started going in the wrong direction, so we waded through the snow and wet sand to another ridge only to have the same thing happen several more times before we reached the peak! But we were not the only ones at the top - there were four young guys who were debating as to which slope they were going to slide down… We had hoped we would see them perform something spectacular down the slopes… but we left them there still debating!! However, we did see some interesting tracks in the snow down the slopes, Maria was quite confused, but Carl knew exactly what they were - the tracks left by a snowball as it rolled down the slope!! Time was getting short so we hustled back to the truck - the only time in our lives that it took more time to go up than it did to go down the mountain!!

Heading towards Kansas

We drove out of the park commenting that the snow had melted since we passed the same location earlier in the day… Unfortunately, we got stuck in the road construction, so we spent the time taking pictures—the melted snow and the shadows really made for some interesting shapes… Back on the main road it was destination Kansas, full speed ahead!! We climbed out of the valley through La Veta Pass - then started the long slow decent into Kansas… Unfortunately, it was getting late, so there wasn’t much light to see the sights - we did wonder about a spine of rock passing through the foothills, but didn’t have time to investigate. The most direct route was along Colorado route 10… we encountered about 10 vehicles on the way - after several days of lots of cars we realized we definitely weren’t on a main road!! We stopped for the night in Lamar, not quite in Kansas but a fair chunk of the way!!

Carl’s Travel Trivia

Yesterday’s Answer: The four States that intersect at Four Corners are: Arizona, Utah, Colorado and New Mexico.
Today’s Question: What natural force deposited the sand at Great Sand Dunes National Park?

Sand Dunes in the Snow