Great Sand Dunes National Park

Note: We visited the Great Sand Dunes National Park on Thursday, July 11, 2019.

Great Sand Dunes National Park is not one of the better known parks in the national parks system. It certainly doesn't get the attention of Yosemite, Arches, or some of the other better known parks scattered around the country. And there doesn't seem to be as much to do at this park as at other parks in the national park system. For example, there are only 20 miles or so of hiking trails in the park.

But most people come to the park because of the sand, and there is a great deal of that. The sand is the real claim to fame for this park. It contains the tallest sand dunes in North America, reaching about 750 feet in height. When you look at pictures of the sand dunes nestled in front of the mountains, they may not appear that tall, but keep in mind that the mountains in the background reach about 12,000 feet or so.

Dunes don't look high, but those are some tall mountains behind them.

Good picture of end of dunes with mountains in background. Note the trees in right side of picture.

Sand related activities are extremely popular in the park, including sand boarding and sand sledding. Other activities are available, though, including hiking, backpacking, 4 wheel drive adventures, bike riding, and horseback riding, among others. Surprisingly, water activities are also available in Medano Creek.

Donna out back of the visitor center.

Donna and I did not spend too much time at the park. For one thing, we had other places we wanted to be later in the day. But we also follow a blog by an RVer who had recently visited the park, and he mentioned how bad the mosquitoes were in the park. As we drove through a couple of campgrounds, we saw just how bad they were. Even driving by, we could see the huge skeeters buzzing around people. In some places, people were constantly waving their hands and arms and shaking their legs to deter the bothersome pests. At one stop, one got in our car, and it was huge, the size of a small hummingbird, it seemed. Okay, I might be exaggerating a bit, but the little rascal was larger than what we are used to.

We did stop for a brief visit at the visitor center. When visiting parks, that is always the best place to start. From there, we drove all the paved roads of the park, including the Pinon Flats campgrounds. Sites are pretty close together, and there is not enough room for large rigs. There is quite a bit of shade in the area, though, and that is always nice. I was amazed at a few of the trailers I saw. How they wedged those rigs into some of those tight sites is beyond me; they are certainly better drivers than I am.

We wanted to explore the area around the creek, but as we drove through the parking lot, we saw the mosquitoes carrying off a few small children, so we decided against that. So, with a long trek still ahead of us, we decided to exit the park and continue our trek to Cripple Creek.

This picture shows the creek running at the base of the dunes. 

If you click on this picture to enlarge it, you should be able to make out the people just above the green area on the far side of the creek in center of picture. This will give you an idea of just how tall the dunes are.