Witzands Aquifer Nature Reserve
Western Cape, South Africa
Witzands is a municipal nature reserve on the Atlantic coast about forty-five kilometres north of the centre of Cape…
32 tickets & tours
By type
Best desert parks to visit worldwide
Desert parks are about light and temperature. The dunes of Namib-Naukluft, the rock arches of Utah, the Pinnacles of Nambung and the lagoons of Lencois Maranhenses all look best in the first and last hour of the day, and in summer the hours between can be dangerous. Tours are timed accordingly: sunrise departures to Sossusvlei, sunset trips to Uluru and the Pinnacles, and 4×4 crossings of the Maranhao dunes that end with a swim.
Nambung National Park
Western Australia, Australia
Nambung is a coastal park on the Indian Ocean about two hundred kilometres north of Perth, the capital of Western…
19 tickets & tours
Arches National Park
Utah, United States
Arches is the park of red sandstone arches beside Moab in eastern Utah, and its entrance has been the most managed in…
13 tickets & tours
Altyn-Emel National Park
Kazakhstan
Altyn-Emel is the desert park in the Ili valley four to five hours north-east of Almaty, and its two great sights, the…
12 tickets & tours
Lençóis Maranhenses National Park
Brazil
Lençóis Maranhenses is the field of white dunes and rainwater lagoons on the coast of Maranhão in north-eastern Brazil,…
12 tickets & tours
Joshua Tree National Park
California, United States
Joshua Tree is the desert park where the Mojave and the Colorado deserts meet, two and a half hours east of Los Angeles…
11 tickets & tours
Ein Gedi Nature Reserve
Israel
Ein Gedi is the oasis on the western shore of the Dead Sea, an hour and a half from Jerusalem and two and a half from…
10 tickets & tours
Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park
Northern Territory, Australia
Uluru stands in the middle of Australia, 450 kilometres by road from Alice Springs, and nearly everyone stays at…
10 tickets & tours
Corralejo Natural Park
Canary Islands, Spain
The Corralejo dunes lie immediately south of the resort town of Corralejo at the northern tip of Fuerteventura in the…
7 tickets & tours
Badlands National Park
South Dakota, United States
Badlands lies on the plains of south-western South Dakota, an hour east of Rapid City along Interstate 90, and it is…
4 tickets & tours
Jandía Natural Park
Canary Islands, Spain
Jandía is the mountainous peninsula that forms the south-western tail of Fuerteventura in the Canary Islands, joined to…
4 tickets & tours
Namib-Naukluft National Park
Namibia
Namib-Naukluft is the largest conservation area in Namibia and one of the largest in Africa, a slab of desert bigger…
4 tickets & tours
Arikok National Park
Aruba
Arikok covers nearly a fifth of Aruba, the rugged, windward north-eastern side of an island whose hotels all stand on…
3 tickets & tours
Slowinski National Park
Poland
The Slowinski National Park lies on the Baltic coast of northern Poland, in Pomerania, midway between the ports of…
2 tickets & tours
Wadi Al-Hitan (Whale Valley)
Egypt
Wadi Al-Hitan, the valley of the whales, is a fossil site in the Western Desert of Egypt, in the governorate of Fayoum,…
2 tickets & tours
Death Valley National Park
California, United States
Death Valley lies in eastern California, against the Nevada line, and the usual way to reach it is from Las Vegas, two…
1 ticket or tour
Los Cardones National Park
Argentina
Los Cardones is a high desert park in the province of Salta, in the north-west of Argentina, and nearly everyone sees…
1 ticket or tour
Morro de Areia Nature Reserve
Cape Verde
Morro de Areia, the hill of sand, is a reserve of dunes, cliffs and empty beach on the south-western coast of Boa…
1 ticket or tour
Saguaro National Park
Arizona, United States
Saguaro National Park protects the giant cactus that is the emblem of the American south-west, and it is unusual in…
1 ticket or tour
Shirvan National Park
Azerbaijan
Shirvan is a flat expanse of semi-desert on the shore of the Caspian Sea in south-eastern Azerbaijan, about a hundred…
1 ticket or tour
Wadi El Gemal National Park
Egypt
Wadi El Gemal, the valley of the camels, is a large protected area on the Red Sea coast of southern Egypt, beginning…
1 ticket or tour
Worimi National Park
New South Wales, Australia
Worimi National Park forms part of the Worimi Conservation Lands, which protect the Stockton Bight dunes, an immense…
1 ticket or tour
Carlsbad Caverns National Park
New Mexico, United States
Carlsbad Caverns lie beneath the Guadalupe mountains in the desert of south-eastern New Mexico, close to the Texas…
No online ticket
Desert National Park
Rajasthan, India
Desert National Park covers a great tract of the Thar desert in the far west of the Indian state of Rajasthan,…
No online ticket
Distances are long and services few, so the day-trip question is simple: how many hours of driving for how many hours in the park. Joshua Tree, Saguaro and Ein Gedi sit beside cities; Altyn-Emel, Wadi El Gemal and the Australian outback parks need a night or two. Season runs opposite to most of the catalogue, with winter the comfortable time in the hot deserts, and some, such as Lencois Maranhenses, have water in the dunes for only a few months. The pages give those months, the fuel and water arithmetic, and the tours that include the permit or the mandatory guide.