In late May, you must cross Medano Creek if you want to get to the Great Sand Dunes--the tallest sand dunes in North America. Some of us (Michelle) decided to go barefoot. This was a mistake. Those of us who had flip flops (Nina and I), opted to carry them with us. This was a mistake. Pablo did not have flip flops.
Medano Creek was cold.
Pablo was the last of the Ruiz-Bentons to leave Medano Creek. Soon he passed me. Then he passed Mari and Nina. Then he passed Emilio.
In what seemed like no time, he was an orange speck in the distance, deaf to our calls and climbing at a steady rate. And the chase began.
Climb a sand dune wearing flip flops and the hot sand will burn your feet. Nina and I stopped on this crest. Mari and Emi are the second set of dune climbers on the left of the photos above. By magnifying the photo above 100%, I can just make out Pablo's white hat on the other side of a distant dune curve.
Emilio eventually joined us here while Mari continued the chase.
Finally Mari managed to reel Pablo back in. If she had started the chase a few minutes later, he might have disappeared over the horizon with no water and been lost to us in the manner of a Paul Bowles short story.
The video above captures the last few seconds of Pablo's Lawrence-of-Arabia-like return to Camp Daddy. He does not appear to be winded in the slightest.
This is what was playing in my head as I watched his approach.
When Mari brought Pablo back to us, she accompanied each of the children on a successful trip down a slope on the sled we had rented in Alamosa (an $18 mistake), which I carried up the hill (another mistake).
The sled did not protect the feet of the sandal-wearers from the heat of the blazing sands.
Those feet later appreciated our return to the cool waters of the Medano (see below).
In the video below, Nina watches as Pablo runs (!) back across the dunes to Aunt Carolyn, while Mari picks up and carries the sled I am hardly able to lift. A random gentleman in the distance walks. A random couple stands and talks. And then the camera finds Emilio finding John Dan, who is carrying yellow plastic sleds that have been refunctioned as shades (they would have served us much better than our $18 rental), and someone who burned her bare feet on the dunes heads gingerly in John Dan's direction to hear about the adventures of the deep dune divers.
I began this day believing that I had to plan gentle vacation hikes because our six-year-olds and my eight-year-old couldn't endure much more. The Great Sand Dunes disabused me of this flattering notion. It is I, not my children, who need to be handled gently. When I fought the Dunes, the Dunes won. I was the first to fall, and I fell hard. For most of the rest of the day, driving was just about all I could do.
On this day in...
2013: "Last Swing;"
2013: "Last Walk at Quartz Mountain:"
2010: "Two N's;"
2010: "Everybody Wants to Hold Norah"
2008: Anniversary Waltz
1 comment:
I was a few years older than Pabi when we arrived to set up camp at a campsite at Purgatory Canyon near Durango, Colorado. My curiosity and enthusiasm for mountains got the best of me as I explored a little ways down a nearby trail. And then a little more and a little more. Many hours later, on the way back and just a hundred yards or less from our camp, I met a park ranger loaded with a backpack of rescue equipment on the way to search for me.
Pablo, I get it, nieto! I know how it is!
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