White Sands National Monument, 2018

West of Alamogordo, a vast area of desert and mountain ranges 100 by 40 miles in extent is closed to public access and used by the military for various kinds of weapons testing; this includes the Trinity Site where the first atomic bomb was detonated, in July 1945. Determined tourists may visit on two days each year, the first Saturdays of April and October, when accompanied tours are provided. The only other feature of interest in this otherwise desolate and unwelcoming land is 60 miles south in the flat Tularosa Basin, where for thousands of years the prevailing westerly winds have deposited gypsum powder – formerly eroded from the nearby San Andres Mountains, washed down by rainwater and deposited in the seasonal Lake Lucero, a few miles southwest – creating a huge area of white dunes covering 275 square miles. About half of the sands are within the boundaries of the White Sands National Monument, one of the most unusual and magical places in the Southwest.

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