The White Sands National Monument is in the northern Chihuahuan Desert. It is known for its dramatic landscape of rare white gypsum dunes.

White Sands Monument.

The coach I was on stopped at the visitor centre at the White Sands Monument before continuing along the road through part of the desert. We stopped in two places. One was where we walked out over a wooden boardwalk to view the desert fauna, and the other was where we climbed up a vast dune.

Although it was a very hard walk up the hot sand of the dunes in the high temperatures, I got to the top to look out over the desert. When I finished, I got back down by belly surfing down the tall dune. It seemed a good idea until I realised I would spend the rest of the day with sand in every orifice.