El Paso Trip--White Sands

I forgot that I was documenting our somewhat of a flop trip to El Paso.  I can't even remember what days we did what so these are all in the wrong order as far as pictures go but that doesn't really matter anyway.  We went to Ruidoso New Mexico when the boys were really little.  On that trip we drove to White Sands National Park.  We decided we wanted to go again on our El Paso trip.  I insisted we take our sled but worried it wasn't going to work and that I was just taking up room in our trunk.  We had read that the disk sleds worked the best and that you needed wax.  We also read that you could find sleds and wax at any of the stores in town like Wal Mart.  The drive from El Paso was almost two hours and when we got to Alamagordo, NM, Mike and I ran into the store to hunt for sleds and wax.  We couldn't find one and an associate said that this was the first year they didn't stock either.  We ran to Walgreens and didn't find any there either.  We decided we would just spend the extra money to buy sleds and wax at the visitors center.  Upon entering the park however, we saw a huge line winding out around the parking lot.  We decided it wasn't going to be worth it to us to wait in that line and hoped for a toilet somewhere in the park and that our sled would work.  The park was packed, which actually surprised us because White Sands is in the middle of no where, no exaggeration.  What were all these people doing there?!  I assume that they had the same idea as us and looking for the one cool thing to do in the area.  The good thing about the dunes though is that once you get away from the entrance, everyone can spread out and there are dune for miles and miles.  We ate our lunch and then drove to the back of the park and then walked far away from everyone until we found steep dunes with no one around.  The sled worked perfectly even without the wax.  The kids played and played.  I had worried that the boys might not like it after the first ten minutes but they all loved it and we spent hours playing.  I would say that White Sands was our most successful day of our trip and I was so glad I insisted on bringing that big sled.