Sunday, May 25, 2014

Great Sand Dunes National Park and a Landspout - 22 May 2014

A lame chase pattern drove Crystal Kerber and myself west into Colorado.  We decided to check out the Great Sand Dunes National Park.  Incredibly, as we drove north across the San Luis Valley toward the park boundary, a weak thunderstorm produced a landspout tornado.  The landspout appeared to develop a few minutes after a sheet of rain emerged.  After watching the landspout (which displayed multiple vortices as it dissipated), we explored the sand dunes for a few hours, eventually being chased back to our car as a second thunderstorm moved northwest off of the Sangre de Cristo mountains.

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Browns Canyon National Monument // Turret Trail // Buena Vista, Colorado

 I escaped the Leadville ice sheet for half a day, driving south to the lower and much warmer terrain of Buena Vista. From there I crossed t...