2026 New Mexico – Day 7 – White Sands National Park

Megan’s Take

Today’s biggest adventure was visiting White Sands National Park. We hiked the 1-mile dune nature trail, which was really pretty and just the right length for the kids.

One of the big activities here is dune sledding. We opted not to bring/rent sleds for the dunes, but instead gave them free play time on the sand. At first, I felt guilty for depriving them of a fun sledding experience, but now I’m glad we didn’t bother. They didn’t ask about sledding beyond “what are those?” (pointing to the sleds), and they were happy with just frolicking in the sand. Plus they were hot and tired out in about a half hour. The temperature reading was around 84 degrees when we got in the truck to head back, and it felt like a HOT 84 degrees, although ironically the gypsum sand here stays cooler to the touch. 

We also went to the New Mexico Space History Museum, which was full of information at a great admission price, but our kids raced through it. Their favorite section was a free build area where the could put together rockets, and I made videos of their “show-and-tell” to tell me about their creations.

After that we went to PistachioLand to see the world’s biggest pistachio (30 ft tall) and buy various pistachio products (free samples worked!) and other yummy foods. 

The rest of the evening was frozen custard at Caliche’s and dinner/swimming/hanging out at the campground. Eating out day after day starts to feel heavy on the body, and it’s a time sink with kids. So it’s nice to have some downtime near the camper to settle after a busy day.

Phil’s Take

White Sands National Park was nice, but I felt it wasn’t as picturesque as Great Sand Dunes National Park in Colorado. It’s further from the mountains, and the mountains aren’t nearly as majestic as they are in Colorado. Plus with the creek running in front of the dunes at GSDNP, it’s hard to compete. The sand, being gypsum, was very fine and was packed quite hard along the trail, making it much easier to walk on than other dunes we’ve visited. I could see doing the 5 mile hike they have at White Sands (as an adult, not with the kids), but there’s no way you could hike that far on pretty much any other dune I’ve visited.

I did manage to capture a pretty good panorama at the end of the hike that gives you a pretty good feel of the place.

Most of the drive through the park is packed sand and a little washboard, but overall a nice drive. There were these huge spots they plowed flat that could fit dozens of vehicles each. We assumed that the park is more busy at other times of the year, because the visitors today only needed a tiny fraction of the space that was available. Of course, we neglected to take any pictures as evidence.

The space museum was cool, though I think the kids are still a bit too young to enjoy it all that much. Obviously they loved those toys you could put together, as seen in the videos, and there were some simulators they could mess with but not successfully do much. I think we’re still not quite there yet for museums in general. It did give us a “Beam me up” photo op, though I’m not Scotty.

While we were enjoying our ice cream, I noted that the skies in deserts seem to commonly look like they’re threatening rain, but they rarely follow through.

The gallery with all of today’s pics is here: