Bicycling Montana, Wyoming,
Colorado and New Mexico - 2006

Alamosa, CO

July 4, 2006

Today we visited the Great Sand Dunes National Park. These Dunes are just to the northeast of Alamosa. It is hard to describe the sand dunes. We arrived just after 9:00 AM, visited the visitor center and then started to climb the sand dunes. It took us almost two hours to reach the highest close Sand Dune. Until we got to this high point the sand dunes do not look so spectacular. But when you look down on all of the lower sand dunes, you suddenly realize just how spectacular this area really is. Some of the dunes are as high as 750 feet.

Looking back toward our automobile, you could see tiny black spots on the sand that were people just starting out on the sand dunes. The Visitor Center is at 8,200 feet elevation. The dunes are made as sand crosses the high dessert and gets trapped by the mountains behind.

After leaving the sand dunes we headed back to Alamosa where we ate lunch and then returned to the motel to do laundry, use the hot tub and get ready to resume traveling via bicycle tomorrow.