Death Valley – Playing Around in the Sand

“Um Alex, my blood sugar number is low. Can you drive my car for me?” This is what I asked my friend when we finished hiking the Mesquite Sand Dunes at Death Valley National Park. One thing you cannot do with low blood sugar is drive a car.

The Wonders of the Mesquite Sand Dunes

My friend Alex and I went to Death Valley National Park on a long weekend trip. Read about the other parts of this trip here, Death Valley – Strenuous Hike and Geologic Wonders. One of the places that we went and hiked around was the Mesquite Sand Dunes. The sand here is weathered granite from the Cottonwood Mountains. These dunes are always changing shape, size, and orientation, especially after a windstorm.

They cover less area and are shorter than many other California dunes, including another sand dunes area in Death Valley National Park, the Eureka Dunes. The Mesquite Sand Dunes claim to fame (in my nerdy opinion) is that this is where R2D2 and C3PO crashed in Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope. There are a couple of other areas in Death Valley National Park where they filmed other Star Wars scenes! As a nerd, I was, and still am, very excited about this!

Hiking the Dunes

Alex and I did not hike out all the way to the farthest, highest dune. We sadly didn’t have too much time to spend at the dunes, but we still did some exploring. One of the first things we experienced was how walking on soft sand is not fun. This is something we both knew from going to the beach, but still, it isn’t the most fun walking/hiking experience.

The soft sand made our hike slow going. Especially when we wanted to hike to the top of a dune. We would try and find the easiest and shortest distance to the top. Sometimes it didn’t matter which way you went, you had to suffer hiking up a steep soft sand slope. Something I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy.

There were some other areas that were hardened and not made of soft sand. These areas were welcome reprieves. It was so fun to see the diversity of the sand dunes. High dunes, low dunes, hard areas, vegetation, all while I was looking for the Star Wars crash site. (Yes, because after all of these years, it would still be there… obviously!)

 Finishing the Hike

At the end of the sand dune hike I started feeling a little off. When we got to the car, I checked my blood sugar number, and it was low. This did not surprise me. I was hiking up and down soft sand hills. That is more work than I’m used to for a hike. Usually, I’m hiking and walking on hard ground. I was doing more work than usual, and it dropped my blood sugar number.

Luckily this happened at the end of the hike, and I didn’t go low during the beginning or middle of the hike. I was carrying a small backpack with plenty of glucose just in case I did go low during the hike.

Alex and I stopped and waited for me to consume enough glucose to get my blood sugar to go back up.

Not Driving My Car While Low

Our plan after the dunes was to drive to the Visitor’s Center. I was the one who drove here, and there was no way I could drive right now. I asked my friend if she would drive my car so we wouldn’t have to wait for my sugar levels to go up. My car is a manual, and I have found that many people in the USA don’t know how to drive a manual. My friend is one of the few who does know how to drive a manual.

Even though she knows and used to drive a manual, she still didn’t feel comfortable driving my car. It had been a while since she had driven one and didn’t want me, the car’s owner, to be low in the passenger seat while she figured out my car. This is totally understandable.

That just meant that we had to wait around 30 minutes until my blood sugar went back up before we could make our way to the Visitor’s Center.

Modifying the Plans with Diabetes Gets in the Way

Luckily, we were able to easily adjust our plans to accommodate for my diabetes. My friend is very patient and has always been very supportive of me and my diabetes. She never makes me feel bad or guilty or in the way if/when anything goes awry. I love her for this, and many other reasons. She is such a great friend. I have said this in other posts that mention her.

We were not on a time crunch, and all of our plans could be changed or modified if we needed to. All we wanted to do was come to Death Valley and bask in the glory of the National Park. And we didn’t let diabetes dampen our spirits, and we enjoyed the park so much that we both vowed to return one day.