Wandering to the Trinity Site

With three UNESCO recognized World Heritage Sites and with a countless number of stunning landscapes that you will be hard pressed to find anywhere else in the country, if not the world, New Mexico has to be at or near the top of the list of states with the largest number of visually stimulating “Gold Star” attractions. (Only California has as many World Heritage Sites as New Mexico.) But of New Mexico’s many Gold Star sites, the Trinity Site, where the first atomic bomb was exploded, may have the most impact!

The Trinity Site, located in the heart of White Sands Missile Range, is open for visitation only two times a year. Traditionally this has been on the first Saturdays of April and October. For 2022, the October visitation date will be the third Saturday of the month – October 15^th. Before planning a trip to Trinity, it might be worthwhile to check the official White Sands Missile Range website to make sure that the dates have not changed.

As a quick background, the atomic bomb was the culmination of World War II’s top-secret Manhattan Project. The Trinity Site, where the bomb was tested, was selected because of its proximity to Los Alamos, where the bomb was developed, its isolation, and the fact that the land was already under military control since it was being used as a bombing range. When the bomb was tested on July 16, 1945, Germany was already out of the war. Unfortunately, the war with Japan was still on and seemed to have no easy end in sight.

With the test being a success, two atomic bombs were dropped on Japan and the war came to an end a month after the test. Whether the bomb should or should not have been dropped is still debated, but it is a discussion for different venue than this blog post. The fact remains that it was dropped, and the impact of nuclear weapons is still with us today. And a visit to Trinity is an opportunity to see and to get a sense of where it began.

My dog Sparky and I were fortunate to have the time this past Saturday (April 2, 2022) to wander down to the Trinity Site. For me, this was my fourth visit. To make our visit more of trip, we drove the Quebradas Backcountry Byway – conveniently located between Albuquerque and the Trinity Site. We even took a couple of hikes while in the Quebradas. The southern end of the Backcountry Byway brought us to within a mile of the turnoff from U.S. 380 to the Trinity Site.

For more information on the Quebradas check out this earlier (2021) blog post – https://gentleartofwandering.com/hiking-and-exploring-in-the-quebradas-backcountry/

When we reached the turnoff to the Trinity Site, we saw several protestors representing the “Downwinders.” As the name suggests, these are people descended from those who lived downwind from Trinity. They believe that their families’ health was and continues to be compromised by radiation from the blast. I personally do not have enough expertise to comment one way or the other.

Not long after passing the protestors, you’ll reach the Stallion Gate of White Sands Missile Range. Since you’re entering an active Army base, there will be a bit of backup to check IDs.

After driving several more miles, you’ll eventually reach the Trinity Site parking area and will have to walk the final quarter of a mile or so to the actual site. (There are shuttles for handicapped visitors.)

When you get closer to where the bomb was exploded, you’ll find an inner and outer fence. If you wander around the outer area you can spot very small pieces of Trinitite on the ground. When the blast went off, it sucked up the sandy soil into the fireball and melted it into greenish glass-like pebbles that rained back down on the ground.

Several years after the blast, the Army plowed the Trinitite back into the ground. You would think that after 76-plus years since the blast that any Trinitite laying on the ground would have been picked up by now. But for some reason, very little pieces of Trinitite keep working their way to the surface.

While checking out the Trinitite laying on the ground, we ran into a young man with a Geiger counter measuring small pieces of Trinitite. He told me that the radiation from the Trinitite and the Trinity Site in general is very low – maybe two or three times higher than normal background radiation. He also told me many antique porcelain pieces and glow-in-the-dark watch faces have way more radiation than Trinity.

I do want to mention that there are many signs stating that it is against the law to gather Trinitite. So if you want to add some Trinitite to your collection, there is a rock shop 17 miles to the east on U.S. 380 that sells Trinitite. There was also someone selling Trinitite by the side of the road going in the other direction. You can even buy Trinitite online!

Once you enter the inner ring, you’ll soon reach the black lava rock monument that marks the blast site. You’ll also see plenty of people waiting to take a selfie in front of the monument.

When I first visited Trinity over 20 years ago, there was a news crew from Japan accompanying a Nagasaki survivor looking for closure on what had happened to him 50-some years before. So there may be something a little bit more serious about a visit to Trinity than taking a selfie.

As you walk around the inner ring, you can see a display of photos showing the blast as it rapidly expanded in less than a second. When I first moved to Albuquerque, I had the pleasure of meeting a man who, when he was a very young soldier in 1945, was part of the photography crew manning the cameras at the blast site. He told me that the fireball was way beyond anything anyone could possibly comprehend.

When you’re ready to leave Trinity, you’ll have to retrace your steps back to U.S. 380. If you go west on U.S. 380, you’ll reach the small settlement of San Antonio very soon after crossing the Rio Grande. San Antonio is famous for two things – Conrad Hilton and green chile cheese burgers. Before starting the Hilton Hotel chain and becoming Paris Hilton’s great-grandfather, Conrad Hilton was born and raised in San Antonio. He was even the community’s State Legislator for a spell.

As for green chile cheese burgers, San Antonio has two famous places to have one – the Owl Bar & Cafe and the Buckhorn Tavern. The Buckhorn was listed as #7 in the nation by GQ Magazine several years ago and even won a “Throwdown” on national TV with Bobby Flay. Unfortunately both restaurants will be very crowded on the two days that Trinity is open. So you may have to make a return trip to fulfill your need for a green chile cheese burger taste sensation.

If you’ve come from out-of-state and are open to adding another awesome Gold Star attraction to your journey, you can drive another hour or so west from San Antonio to the Very Large Array (VLA). Seeing the 27 huge radio telescopes of the VLA spread out across the Plains of San Augustin is just plain awesome. And if you remember the movie Contact, this is where Jodie Foster first heard the signals coming from Vega!

And with this our wandering adventure to the Trinity Site has come to an end.