The Trinity Site

Press release today there will be no open house on April 4th.

A little side note for those who have not been to White Sands...several years ago we were walking on the dunes not realizing one of the meds I was taking had a warning about being light sensitive. The white sand is so bright that by the time I got back to the Jeep it looked as if I had the world's worst case of measles. The red spots lasted for several days so read your medication warnings before visiting White Sands.

Williebago wrote:
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Do it, you won't regret it. And for those who have not been to White Sands add a couple of more days to your trip and spend there. Another amazing place in the "Land of Enchantment". Enjoy your trip.

second the notion of seeing White Sands. there are two White Sands...the missile range/proving grounds museum and the new national park, the museum is also on an active military base. you WILL need photo id's for everyone in your party, a background check will be conducted and your vehicle WILL be searched. took us about 30-minutes to gain entry but, IMO, it's well worth it.

http://www.wsmr-history.org/index.htm
https://www.nps.gov/whsa/index.htm

the two facilities are about 30-min apart.

pigfarmer wrote:

Wow Williebago! That does sound interesting but is it possiple to do? They are in opposite directions and miles apart. We figured a day for each.


unless something has changed all you’ll need at Trinity is an hour or so. the VLA is about a 90-min drive.


pigfarmer:
We were waiting on the edge of the highway thirty minutes before they open the north gate to access the Trinity Site. Be sure and have a photo ID as your are entering a secure military base and they check those things. There is acres of desert parking and plan on a quarter of a mile hike on level terrain to the site itself. It is interspersed with exhibit plaques and the monument itself is a lava rock obelisk built on Ground Zero of the blast.

All kind of sobering if you really stop to think about it. Also, there is the farm stead about a mile and a half or so from ground zero that survived the blast and has been preserved by the Park Service. Be sure and go there as well. It is where they did some final assemble work on the core and has a framed copy on the bedroom wall of the letter from Einstein to President Roosevelt explaining why the Manhattan project was necessary and why we needed to be the first to develop the atomic bomb. If I remember correctly they say that a half day visit is the equivalent of a single dental Xray and less than a trans-continental airplane flight.

In all, if you are early on the site in the morning, you will be able to have lunch at the Owl Bar in San Antonio and have their world famous green chili cheeseburger. Then continue the drive to the VLA and spend the entire afternoon there. As I mentioned, it is the only place I know where you can be in the control room and look thru a glass wall at the massive super computer that processes all of the data the 27 radio telescopes collect. Fascinating! At the gift shop purchase a DVD of the movie contact with Jodie Foster and watch it that night in your RV.

We then drove back to the Bosque Birdwatchers RV park south of San Antonio but just north of the Bosque del Apache wildlife refuge. Spent the next day there watching all of the sandhill cranes and geese in migration and hoping to see a rare Whooping crane that are occasionally there as well.

Do it, you won't regret it. And for those who have not been to White Sands add a couple of more days to your trip and spend there. Another amazing place in the "Land of Enchantment". Enjoy your trip.

Thanks for mentioning the Trinity site. I have wanted to go for years but never could justify a vacation around it. Not a problem now. The VLA was kinda cool a couple years ago. I camped at nearby Datil Well CG and had some internet friends from Socorro meet up for a few cold ones.

I'll highly recommend the National Museum of Nuclear Science and History in Albuquerque NM. It's just off of I-40 and Eubank Blvd, very easy to get to and in and out.

https://www.nuclearmuseum.org/

Was stationed at The AF base in the early 60s and had a Range Pass and a blue vehicle. Visited ground 0 several times and picked up trinitite off the ground. The shallow depression was coated with it. The huge metal tube that was supposed to capture the uranium if the nuclear explosion did not work was still there but they never figured out how to get it to the top of the tower so it was not used. We had to wear radiation badges when we were on the range. Was back a few years ago and took the tour but the site is a lot different now. The other interesting place on the range was the Victoria Peak gold but that's another story we never saw any evidence of it. Visit the Museum in Alamogordo lots of interesting stuff to see.

pigfarmer wrote:
Wow Williebago! That does sound interesting but is it possiple to do? They are in opposite directions and miles apart. We figured a day for each.

unless something has changed all you’ll need at Trinity is an hour or so. the VLA is about a 90-min drive.

Wow Williebago! That does sound interesting but is it possiple to do? They are in opposite directions and miles apart. We figured a day for each.

The Trinity Site is on my bucket list.