On day 26, we drove from Santa Fe to Alamogordo, New Mexico. The drive was about 4 hours. It started out with flat ranch land and a small road in the middle of nowhere.

Then it turned mountainous and a storm rolled in. The storm brought high winds, rain, and dust blowing so hard you couldn’t see.

By the grace of God, we made it safely to the White Sands KOA in Alamogordo. The park is the city, and strangely located, but it was only $42 a night. We had to sit in the truck for about 30 minutes for the rain to die down before we could set up. Jim took one for the team and set everything up in the rain while I stayed dry in the truck with the dogs. 😆

After we got dry and warm, we had a late lunch. Then, we drove about 20 minutes to White Sands National park. We downloaded an audio tour of the park with the Action Tour Guide App for $14.99.

The park was totally different than all of the parks we’ve visited so far, but just as beautiful. There are sand dunes as far as the eye can see. In fact, in the tour we learned that the park is so big that it can be seen from space.

The park starts out with some green as you first drive in.

The green quickly disappears along with the paved road as everything turns to sand.

The dunes with the mountains in the background are beautiful. We got out several times to climb to the top of the dunes.

The sand isn’t like beach sand. It’s made of gypsum. It reflects the sun and stays cool.

Many people were sledding down the dunes. You can bring your own sled or rent one at the visitor’s center. We didn’t sled because we brought the dogs with us. White Sands is a dog friendly park. You can take dogs everywhere in the park as long as they are on a leash. Our dogs loved the sand and were so happy to run around there and climb the dunes. We heard that for some reason, dogs really like the gypsum sand.

White Sands costs $25 to get in, or you can use the annual National Park Pass for $80. (We have saved a lot with this so far). The park is open 7:00 am to dusk (1 hour past sunset) everyday…unless they’re doing missile testing! 🤪 The government still does testing at the park and in fact, the day before we arrived the park had been closed for testing. This was also the area that the first nuclear bomb was tested in.

We really enjoyed this park, and we all (including the dogs) came home sandy and tired like a day at the beach!😁