The deserts and sands are the best landscapes for finding old and abandoned buildings. The arid climate lends itself to preservation, and there is little danger of serious decay or damage from flooding. At the same time, the sand is an ever-shifting geographic feature that can swallow whole towns both quickly (as in a violent sandstorm) or slowly (as it shifts over time). This article deals with the partially buried buildings in sand, some of which were abandoned for hundreds of years, and some only a few years.