Great Sand Dunes National Park

After awhile things finally started to change in Colorado, it was getting late but at least the drive was getting exciting.

First we came across miles of apparently abandoned box cars. They ended in a small town, made up of only a few trailers and a bar.

As we neared our destination for the night, we finally entered hills. In the last hour or so we went through a mountain pass where we saw elk and some snow flurries.

The next morning we climbed out of the truck to a breathtaking sight.

The Great Sand Dunes of Colorado are a beautiful sight, the dunes look like they were taken out of the Sahara Desert and dumped at the foot of huge Colorado Mountains.

This river, currently in its dry season, carries down the sand that makes up the dunes. The sand is blown into huge dunes before being blown back up into the mountains to come down again in the river.

Our first day we went on a 12 mile dirt road called Medano Pass. Medano Pass took us high and deep into the mountains for some awesome views.

The road was pretty remote and peaceful, once we got a mile or two in we saw only a handful of vehicles parked for camping or hunting.

That night we got a campsite with a perfect sunset view.

The next day we ventured into the dunes themselves, the sand was firmer than beach sand but still difficult to walk uphill in.

Once we got to high peak, we had a beautiful 360 view. High peak is the second highest dune at 8600', the dunes start at 8,000'. Starting with the picture above we turned to the right and took pictures of the whole view.

Time to head back down to do one more thing before we leave...

Sand skiing and boarding!

After seeing kids sledding and a guy snowboarding we decided we had to try it as well. The sand was just like sticky snow and the skiing and boarding was better than we expected!

  

Our final view of the sand dunes as we headed north to Vail, CO to visit Haejin's brother Young.