The Great Sand Dunes

We arrived at the Sand Dunes Motel at around dinner time.  We ate in the restaurant at the motel and  then went to explore the dunes before the sun went down.  It was cloudy and windy and looked like it might storm.

View of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains from the dunes.

Eric and Hannah wanted to climb up to the top despite the weather.  After they took off, Mike talked to a park ranger who said that the storm was coming and that lightning was really dangerous here and that we needed to get those kids off the dunes, NOW!  I took off walking up the dunes, but there was no way I was going to reach them.  I was praying as I was walking.  Mike sat down on a log and started pleading with the Lord to protect our kids.  As he was praying, the storm literally changed direction and headed away form the dunes.  We felt the hand of the Lord protecting our children that night.
This picture is as close as I could get to them and it's zoomed in as much as I could get! Those little dots on top are Eric and Hannah.

The Old Padre

They made it back and we all said a prayer of thanks.

The next morning we woke up and it was a beautiful sunny day.  The dunes took on a whole new look in the sunshine.  This is the view outside of our window.  It was breathtaking.  They had lots of hummingbird feeders and tons of hummingbirds--my favorites!

We rented a wooden board for sliding down the dunes and we headed up.

We felt like we were in the Sahara Desert.

At the top!