Enter Sandman

I have a sand collection. Yes, that's right: SAND. Glorious sand! It all started in Cancun when I brought back some white sand from my vacation. Since then, I've increased my small collection (with help from friends) to include sand from France, Spain, Arizona, and Yosemite. Some sands are more distinctive than others, such as Arizona's characteristic red sand and Yosemite's yellow sand.

Since then, I've been trying to diversity from standard brown sand. I've been on the look out for exotic sand, and here's what I've been able to find out:

• The beaches of Bermuda have pink sand. The pink colour is from the shells of microscopic creatures.
• Volcanic islands have beaches with black sand. The big island of Hawaii has such sand on Punalu'u.
• Hawaii is also home to the world's only green sand beach, located in a remote area of the big island. The green colour is from olivine crystals, which are supposed to be very rare.
• In California, they have purple beaches (e.g. Pfeiffer Beach). The purple colour is from Manganese garnet.

This is all I've discovered thus far. If you know of places where other exotic sands exist, please let me know. I think that a trip to Bermuda and/or California would be a pretty easy matter. There is an element of illegality to having a sand collection because it's something you have to declare on your customs card, but I never do.

While Hawaii is an awesome place to visit, I hear that the island goddess Pele curses anyone who removes rocks or sand from her island. Apparently this was an urban legend created by a Park Ranger, but there have been people who mail back rocks to the Hawaiian post office with notes of forgiveness. I can mess with Customs Canada, but I don't want to mess with Pele. More details here.