Backcountry Camping Trail: A Must-Do When Visiting White Sands National Park | New Mexico

first time here I'm Dustin and I'm Vy. We're at White Sands National Park and we are hopefully going to be doing the Backcountry Camping Trail. This trail is about two miles loop I believe and if you are standing about 200 feet you'll be climbing over dunes about 200 feet. It doesn't sound that much but you'll be hiking in the sand. We're going to be facing somewhere around 20 mile an hour winds today. Supposedly closer to 40 mile an hour winds give you complete whiteout conditions so hopefully we won't experience that. And the other funny thing is I'm sure you've heard in many videos we always harp on footwear choices but with the very soft sand like we have experienced here so far our footwear choices are um. We're gonna go barefoot. We're gonna we're gonna go barefoot. The sand here is actually very very soft and very fine and it's very nice and cool even though the temperature outside is like a over 80s and you still it's still very nice and cool. We learned that because it doesn't contain silica so it doesn't hold heat. Yeah isn't that crazy? So yeah we're excited about hiking barefoot and then apparently this trail is super cool because it's going to show you all the big dunes and stuff in the park but then you don't have to do the big big longer hike the 4.3 miles loop of uh Alcafali. I forgot the other name but like one of the bigger ones. Oh my god I'm so bad. But yeah the bigger hike. So this one is shorter but it can give you the same view. So we're gonna head out and barefoot. Wish us luck. Make sure to pay attention to this marker. This is the orange marker. This is the marking of your trail. If you don't see the next marker before you leave this this first one that means you're lost. So turn back because you you should always be able to see the next market before you leave the first one. So very very important otherwise it's very easy to get lost out here. Everything especially in the wind conditions if everything is wiped out you won't be able to see where you're going. Okay very important. It's amazing how fast the conditions can change out here. Look at how deeply this marker is buried in the sand. If you enjoy random factoids as much as I do here's a great one for you. Even though the park is called White Sands National Park the sand here is not actually white. The sand here is composed mainly of gypsum which is a clear substance. When all the grains are constantly banging into each other they cause scratches which reflect the sunlight giving its white color. Here you see the tracks of the tiny North American V. I think she passed through here about two minutes ago. Oh you hang on. We found her. We found her. After we crossed over to interdune from the parking lot you actually get over here to this one side and then you do have that orange marker on the that fell down earlier you see in the picture so we I mean in the video. So this is the start of your loop. You can go either left you can see like far away there there's so there's some orange marker or there are more orange marker on the right so that's the whole loop. It will take you to the campsite the backcountry camping campground and or just like a beautiful hike. So we're gonna go left first you can go whichever ways you want. One thing that we would highly recommend if you plan on doing this hike is to bring a tracker. We use the Garmin inReach and it's a great idea to have something like that just in case you get lost. All the white dunes can get pretty disorienting and especially if you're doing the hike in conditions like we're doing it in you need to be able to find your way back if you lose track of those markers. One of the downsides to attempting this hike in these conditions is that you might be able to see this sand blowing over the top of this dune. As soft and cool as the gypsum is to walk in it feels like you're getting hit with needles when you have to walk through that. We are now about half a mile into the hike and we are arriving at campsite 10. This is one of the first campsites that you will come to along the hike and I must say that as amazing as it would be to be camping out and be surrounded by the dunes I don't think it would be a good idea in conditions like this. After passing campsite 10 you will be making a right. Unfortunately for us this meant that we would be heading straight into some of the sandstorms. About three-tenths of a mile later we came to the second campground which is campground 8. This is a much wider open area and it seems like it could handle larger groups of campers. If you're going to be doing this barefoot like we did you need to be careful when you're walking near the campsites. We ended up finding a tent stake that somebody left behind and that probably would not have felt great to step on. And I think that it goes without saying but if you're going to be camping or hiking here please be sure to clean up after yourself. Even though this hike doesn't have a very long overall distance climbs like this can make it seem like a much more substantial trek. We are now past the halfway point and the wind is really ramping up. There were plenty of times where it seemed like it was just easier to walk backwards. And at this point we were out in the middle of nowhere and we had no choice but to finish it. But at least we weren't out here suffering alone. One other interesting fact about White Sands National Park is that it is a rather young park. It has only had its national park status since 2019 but it first gained its national monument status way back in 1933. I think that at this point the razor-sharp sand, the strong winds and the never-ending white sand dunes had taken its toll on us mentally. For some reason we thought we were singers. We're losing our minds out here. After a standing ovation from our imaginary audience we found what looked like a large boulder. But it ended up just being compressed sand. If heading off into the dunes by yourself does not seem like something that you want to try you should definitely check out the Ranger Guided Sunset Stroll and Full Moon Hike. They have a list of their full moon hikes on their website and the sunset strolls are typically on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. We wanted to do the sunset stroll while we were there but unfortunately it got canceled due to the wind. I will say that as miserable as things got during several points of this hike I would definitely love to come back and do it again in better conditions. But as far as this attempt goes I can't begin to tell you how happy we were when we saw the car. We made it! Wow, absolutely gorgeous out there but that was tough. I mean we hiked in like 30, 35 a mile per hour wind before but it's completely different when you're out there in the sand because like when that sand hits you it feels like sandpaper. Very exfoliating. I probably have the legs of a of a of strapping 20 year old now. And I'll wear shorts. Like I had no idea it's gonna be this bad like we didn't know about the wind until we got here and then yeah that wasn't that fun. I think I have bruises or something I'm not sure but it hurts and there are times when I feel like we've been pushed down. I mean luckily like it's soft it's not a big deal but like the wind was so strong that you keep you know feel like you're upside back and forth. So yeah according to the rangers I forget if I mentioned this before we're at 20 mile an hour winds and that's probably about as close as I would want to get to white out conditions like it was there was times where it was hard to see where you were going around 40 miles an hour is just. I don't know even like maybe 25 30 I probably wouldn't attend this hike just because the wind was so strong like it's crazy and you can't even see where you're going it gets really really hazy out there and you can't see your markers and yeah you don't want to get lost out there in this condition. Yeah yeah glad we I'm glad we pushed through like there was a time when we were kind of like might call it early glad we pushed through but uh yeah that was that was that was a challenge. We'll do it again but not not with this wind yeah next time yeah but um but yeah we'll move on to the next uh we'll see you guys in the next video yeah and then if you like us give us a like subscribe uh if you have any questions any comments leave them below and we'll happy to answer them for you okay well the next one