Dumont Dunes
Death Valley Dunes (aka Stovepipe Wells Dunes)
Eureka Dunes, CA
Clayton Valley (Silver Peak)Sadly, you can only ride on two of the five dunes that I flew over (Dumont and Clayton Valley). I recently wrote an article for
Sand Addiction Magazine that is worth repeating here.
Hope you enjoy....
It was only fourteen years ago, but for off-roaders, the Southern California desert will never be the same. The California Desert Protection Act was adopted in October 1994, and in an instant, off-roaders lost access to nearly 3.5 million acres that were designated at Wilderness Areas.
The California Desert Protection Act was first introduced by Senator Alan Cranston back in the mid-eighties, but didn’t gain traction until 1992 when Cranston retired and California elected two new U.S. senators, Democrats Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer. Before 1992, passage of the Desert Act was stymied by the opposition of Republican Senator Pete Wilson and later Senator John Seymour.
In 1994, Environmentalist took advantage of a window of opportunity in the 103rd Congress when the election of President Clinton and a Democratic majority in both houses of Congress meant both supportive administrative agencies (BLM, NPS, etc.) and congressional committee chairs. The California Desert Protection Act moved to the Senate floor in the final days of the 103rd Congress and was met with four separate Republican filibusters aimed at killing the bill. The Democrats needed sixty votes to override the filibusters, and they held the Senate in session a day after the scheduled adjournment and finally succeeded.
On October 31, 1994 President Bill Clinton signed into law the California Desert Protection Act, and as a result, over seven million acres of new wilderness and national parks gained protection. Forever lost to off-roaders, the new wilderness and park areas contained several sand dunes that off-roaders once had access, but were now locked out.
Here is an overview of a few sand dunes that were permanently closed as part of the Desert Protection Act.
Cadiz Dunes, CA
The Cadiz Dunes is located between the Mojave National Preserve and Joshua Tree National Park in San Bernardino County.
The Cadiz Dunes Wilderness closed off 21,298 acres of dunes and desert. The Wilderness boundary is within 30 ft. of the Atchison Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad tracks and a natural gas pipeline. And the really silly part of the designation is it also contains private land (inholdings). The main cause of the inholdings is checkerboarding due to railroad land grants under the Pacific Railway Act. It sure would be interesting to buy one of these pieces of land within the Wilderness area and make the environmentalist squirm as I ride my ATV on my land.
GPS Coordinates: 34°23'36.66"N, 115°25'20.70"W
Eureka Dunes, CA
The Eureka Dunes lie in the remote Eureka Valley which is now in the northwest of Death Valley National Park. The dunes cover an area that is 3 miles long and 1 mile wide, yet they are the tallest sand dunes in California, and second tallest in all of North America (beat out by the dunes at Great Sand Dunes National Park). They rise suddenly more than 680 feet above the dry lakebed at their western base. The dunes are part of a 200,000 acre Wilderness Area and are also home to a few endangered species.
BLM closed the dunes to OHV use in 1976, but with the Desert Protection Act the dunes experienced a much higher level of protection that would take another act of Congress to overturn.
GPS Coordinates: 37° 5'4.30"N, 117°40'25.88"W
Ibex Dunes, CA The Ibex dunes are in the very South-Eastern portion of Death Valley National Park and just seven miles north of Dumont Dunes. The dunes are part of the 26,460 acre Ibex Wilderness Area.
For years before the 1994 California Desert Protection Act, the Bureau of Land Management managed the area and dismissed it as “mundane,” “monotonous” and “common,” not worthy of high protection. In addition to this, the Rainbow Mine was an on again off again talc mine that lay within the proposed Wilderness area. Despite the fact that an area worthy of the country’s highest level of protection should be undeveloped Federal land retaining its primeval character and influence, without permanent improvements, the Rainbow Mine and Ibex Dunes were included within the park’s expanded boundaries.
The owners of the mine sought park service permission to reopen the mine, but after years of waiting and frustration they gave up sold the land to the government.
GPS Coordinates: 35°41'27.22"N, 116°22'4.96"W
Kelso Dunes, CA The Kelso Dunes lay within Mojave National Preserve, 50 miles south of Baker. Rising 600 feet above the surrounding desert floor, Kelso Dunes are the second tallest of all of California's dunes.
The Kelso Dunes are now within the Kelso Dunes Wilderness Area which covers 129,580 acres.
The Kelso Dunes were closed to OHV use in the 1970’s, but just like the Eureka Dunes, the Desert Protection Act provided them with a much higher level of protection.
GPS Coordinates: 34°54'12.12"N, 115°43'5.93"W
North Algodones
The Imperial Sand Dunes Recreation Area encompasses approximately 159,000 acres of which 32,000 acres is designated as the North Algodones Dunes Wilderness. The Wilderness Area is located on the north side of highway 78 and world famous Glamis is on the south side.
GPS Coordinates: 33° 0'27.51"N, 115°10'29.31"W
Environmentalists are not satisfied with the areas they locked us out of with the Desert Protection Act. Environmental organizations are well funded, well organized and have many allies in Washington D.C.
Please do your part to keep the riding area we do still have open. Support OHV access organizations by volunteering your time and donating financially. Also be sure to find out how candidates stand on public land access issues like Wilderness designations and the Endangered Species Act and then vote to support those who stand behind OHV access.
If you have any pictures stashed away in the attic of off-roading at these dunes from back in the day when it was legal, please send an email to
jon@duneguide.com. It is important to me to document what we have lost so future generations can see what has already been taken from us.
