Sand skiing

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Marjorie Turner Hollman is an author, creator, and observer who loves the outdoors. Link to all Marjorie’s books.

Have you ever felt like you’ve been someplace before, even when you know the surroundings are new to you? On a recent trip I got that feeling, though perhaps, it was more of an echo of the past. Different state, different circumstances, and with different people. One common denominator tied my memory with the reality: sand dunes. We stopped to visit Indiana Dunes National Park. The Indiana Dunes State Park is adjacent to the national park and thus a substantial stretch of dunes buffers the surrounding area from the mighty waves of Lake Michigan.

A sign greeted us as we stared up at the massive sand dune towering over the very edge of our parking area. Prohibited activities include sledding and skiing. I learned later that the reference to skiing implied winter conditions and snow but on first reading, I had a flashback to our sand skiing adventures during the summers of my childhood spent at my grandmother’s beach house. Her retreat stood overlooking Santa Rosa Sound on Santa Rosa Island near Pensacola, Florida.

This barrier island consists of miles of sand dunes and lies between the Gulf of Mexico and Santa Rosa Sound.

When we were growing up, water skiing was a favored pastime. We spent hours being pulled behind my uncle’s motor boat, skimming along the mostly quiet waters of Santa Rosa Sound. My grandmother’s beach house was mere steps away from the water. We skinny tadpole cousins were in the water more than out.

Unlike water skiing, sand skiing requires sand dunes. No boats are involved and no ski lifts are available. On occasion our neighbor offered to take us to a place where impressive dunes stood. On these outings we gathered up beat-up water skis that had outlived their usefulness and transformed them into sand skis.

Each trip down the dunes first required trudging up the steep sand hills, dragging our battered skis with us. The skis, though no longer used for waterskiing, were much worse for the wear after multiple trips sliding down the abrasive sandy surface of those dunes. Water skis are wider than snow skis. This worked to our advantage when slipping down the slopes on Santa Rosa Island.

Siblings, cousins and friends all clustered at the crest of the dunes, ready for yet another trip from the top to the shoreline. We sometimes took solo trips, but more often two or more of us piled onto one ski. The scene was akin to children sailing down a snowy slope on a sled or toboggan. The similarity, however, was lost on us Florida-raised kids. Snow was not a part of our vocabulary other than as a theoretical concept with no basis in our reality.

When I checked with siblings and cousins about their memories of sand skiing, each quickly answered “Yes.” They all remembered. They also remembered the joy of sailing down the slopes. Even the youngest of us recalled the steep climb, and the slippery sand that slowed our progress uphill. The least athletic of us remembered participating.

None of us wanted to be left out. The sense of sailing down sand dunes toward the shoreline—those memories remain.

Indiana Dunes National Park offers similarities to Santa Rosa Island but important differences are apparent, far beyond simple geography. My sensation of having been here before clashed with reality. But first, the similarities.

Santa Rosa Island hosts sparkling white sand beaches. In Indiana, white beach sand very close in appearance to Santa Rosa Island lines the shore. But dipping our hands in the water of Lake Michigan we tasted fresh, not salt water.

Shrubs and pines grew up the sides of sections of the Indiana dunes while the island at the edge of the Gulf hosted mostly graceful, blond sea oats.

Driftwood, tossed onto the shore by storms, littered the strip of sandy beach in Indiana.

Climbing sand dunes is destructive to the environment. I would not even consider doing it today, nor would I encourage others to inflict damage on these sensitive habitats. Am I pleading ignorance of the impact of our presence on those dunes? Maybe. Perhaps I am simply hopeful that the impact of our very limited adventures was soon healed over by the shifting sands. The dunes did what they have always done—protecting coastlines from destruction with windblown sand settling in new places.

Those very dunes, I have heard, were later bulldozed to make room for high-rise condominiums. The seawalls built to protect the buildings’ foundations soon induced scouring of the rest of the island’s shoreline. So our dunes are gone. I feel confident, however, that ultimately nature will win. One hurricane, sending massive storm surges across this barrier island, will effectively wipe out years of investment, toil, and construction. While fragile, the nature of dunes and their impermanence is actually key to their resilience. Structures we view as permanent are not very adaptable to changing sea levels.

Our parting view of the Indiana dunes was at sunset. The sky glowed a deep red, almost crimson. Eerie light filled the skyline as we stood on the shores of Lake Michigan. We were mesmerized by the glowing heavens. The buildings of Chicago provided a distant counterpoint to the vastness of the sky and the steady drumbeat of crashing waves pounding the shore.

Marjorie Turner Hollman