The Ghost of White Sands New Mexico

The Spirit of Pavla Blanca

I have a confession to make. I’d never even heard of this place up until a few weeks before I left to drive down here from my home in the frozen north. Only by chance while looking at random photos of New Mexico did I first see the bleached dunes of White Sands National Park. With its desert setting and alien landscape I immediately put it on my list of places to visit while on a three-week road trip through the USA.

A place like this cannot exist without some lure attached to it. In the early 1500s a great battle was fought on the edge of the white desert. A Spanish conquistador named Hermando de Luna and his men, while in search of the Seven Cities of Cibola and Gran Quivia were attacked by a band of Apache warriors. Defeated, the survivors fled south to Mexico City. Having been severely injured in the attack, Hermando de Luna disappeared into the dunes never to be seen again.

Legend has it, the brave conquistador’s fiancé set out to find him amongst the sprawling white dunes. Her ghost is told to sometimes be seen haunting the lonely desert. Pavla Blanca, as her spirit is referred to is believed to be seen wandering through the sands just after sunset as the evening breeze works its way over the empty dunes.

I didn’t see any ghosts while I was there but I can understand how such a story could take shape in a place like this. Driving into the park you are surrounded by a chalk white landscape that extends out in every direction. The dunes give off an intense glare that I wasn’t prepared for as I hiked to the top of the highest point I could find.

I spent hours that day wandering through the open desert. My steady breathing was the only sound as I hiked from one dune to the next. As a single dot in a barren milky white landscape, I plodded on over frosted white ridge lines and flat open plains. I had avoided the crowds and headed far off on my own. White Sands is the only place of its kind, which gives the area an extra special feel.

White Sands is made up of gypsum crystals and is the largest white sand desert of its kind in the world. Several movies have been filmed there over the years, including the first two Transformer films. The region is also home to the White Sands Missile Range which was the site of the Trinity explosion, the first test of an atomic bomb. The oldest known human footprints in North America have been found at White Sands. It is believed that humans have been living in this region for 23,000 years.

As the day progressed the sun lowered over the mountains softening the glare of the white desert. The blue-pink evening sky was the perfect backdrop for the sugary white dunes as their shadows now gave a new dimension to the barren landscape. I lingered as long as I could in the fading light as I knew I might not have this moment again. I may not have seen any ghosts that day, but being in White Sands Park as the sun slipped behind the mountains I could feel why this place has earned such a mystic.

As I walked back to the car a light breeze picked up scattering snowy white sand crystals across the dunes. It is this white sandy vale that is believed to be the gown of Pavla Blanca as she swipes across the dunes looking for her fallen lover. Ghost or not it was beautiful to watch and was my parting memory of White Sands as I drove off into the night.

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