Birthday 2016 - Southwest Road Trip

We went to White Sands National Monument in July to celebrate my birthday! It is an amazing place. The roadtrip consisted of:

• Scottsdale, AZ 
• Las Cruces, NM 
• Tucson, AZ

 The southwest is really such a beautiful place. There are so many places to discover. Hopefully we get to head back out there. But not in July. Or any month during the summer. It was 99 degrees at 9:00PM in Scottsdale. I like heat but that is a little much for me.

White Sands NM itself did not disappoint. Luca had an incredible time running and jumping on the dunes. The sand itself wasn't hot since it isn't actually sand. It's a gypsum where if you stuck your toes in, it was almost cool! However, he started getting cranky and complained of feeling sick. We thought he was constipated due to potty training stress. But then he was getting kind of listless and his skin was cool instead of hot like I thought it would be in the heat. We became alarmed and left early. I looked up the symptoms and he was likely entering early stages of heat exhaustion which can lead to heat stroke, which is really scary for a little one! So, I'm really glad we left despite spending the least amount of time in the place that was the goal for the entire trip.