Mesa Verde National Park

When I was a small child, my parents bought a set of books that were sold weekly in the grocery store. One was about paleontologists. Another showed a picture of Mesa Verde's Cliff Palace. I grew up, went to school, and became an Earth Science teacher with a degree in Geology. I took my students on field trips, collected fossils and still do today. Yesterday Renita and I toured the Cliff Palace at Mesa Verde National Park. Bless you Mom and Dad.

We arrived in Cortez on Sunday, and set up at Sundance Rv Park. The next day we went to the Welcome Center and then drove out to the park. We hadn't planned on touring any ruins, only figuring out possible things to do. However it worked out we ended up going on the Cliff Palace Tour.

Cliff Palace is the largest cliff dwelling in the desert southwest. The only other tour open, at this time of year was Balcony House which involved a thirty foot climb on a wooden ladder. This was not attractive to Renita. We bought tickets for the Cliff Palace and it ended up a great choice.

The tour was packed with 60 people and one ranger so we used "Spanish rules" and made sure we had great viewing spots on the tour,(When we traveled to Spain with the kids we went to a town fiesta in Segovia. When the food was set on the table everyone rushed it with no lines or order. We called this chaos, Spanish rules.).

The wood in the ruins was actually from 1200ad. You can see the tags where it has been removed for dendrochronology. Renita overheard a Hopi women on the tour who stated that the round rooms were not Kivas, or ceremonial rooms, disputing the rangers lecture. I asked about any cut marked bones found at the sight, but the ranger said she was not going to answer as there were Hopi's on the tour. Apparently the park service is treading water as usual........

We finished the tour by climbing up a series of steps and wooden ladders. The ladders seemed well used to me but held my weight. We drove out, stopping and viewing several other cliff houses. A fine day. Clear skies.

The Four Corners

The story we had heard, is that the four corners was a Navajo Tourist trap. The fee was three bucks apiece. This allowed us to drive to the Four Corners Memorial, get our picture taken, and spend some more money at the flea market.

The parking lot was rough, in places, and graveled. This had also been mentioned to us. With all the whining about this place who would ever enjoy it? We did!

After the pictures, we spent time buying more Native Art and jewelry. Finally we ran out of money and left for Cortez, Colorado. Clear skies.

The Canyon Jeep Tour

On our last full day at Canyon De Chelly we decided to view the Canyon from the bottom up! So we bought tickets for the full day jeep tour,(6.5 hours and a lunch).
It was money well spent!

We loaded up at the Thunderbird Lodge. Both of us were concerned about the cold so we wore multiple layers of clothing. We were fine. We were even warm when the jeep plunged into the river.

The first part of the tour was up Canyon De Muerto to Mummy Cave Ruins. The jeep trail went in and out of the river, if you could call it a trail. We passed a stuck truck, it was getting pulled out, and at one point we even got stuck, (I was glad I didn't drive our truck but our son Matt would have loved it with his).

As we drove and stopped, the guide told us that there were over 600 ruins, identified in the two canyons. He also explained the many pictographs and petroglyphs. They belonged to three different periods. It was a real learning experience.

At one stop Navajo girls waded out into the river to offer us necklaces that they had made. The people are so poor that everywhere you go you encounter blankets covered with jewelry and stone art. We were eve able to buy freshly made Navajo Fry Bread. We watched as the Navajo Women fired the bread dough in hot grease and then covered it with cinnamon and sugar. Lunch was at the Mummy Cave Ruins. The guide explained that the mummies were unusual in that the average height of the people was about five feet and that one of the mummies found here was six foot tall. At one of the stops we could see the handholds and fotholds used to climb the cliffs. We loaded back up and headed back down the canyon stopping once to stretch and view more pictographs.

At Junction, we turned and headed up Canyon De Chelly. We passed more ruins and continued up to White House Ruins. That was the place we had hiked down the day before. Luckily the merchants were still there and we were able to buy much needed jewelry and stone art.

The drive back to the lodge was all too short. However our senses were overloaded and it was time to get back home and pack the house for the trip to Mesa Verde.
Clear skies.

White House Ruin and the South Rim

The next day started pretty easy as we got up and did some chores. We were waiting for the afternoon as the plan was to hike the White House Ruin trail and the guidebook said that the afternoon was best for photos.
We finally left the house at noon and drove to the trail head. Oh my! The trail is a 500 foot vertical drop and is about 3 miles roundtrip. Looking down, from the overview you could easily see the ruins at the bottom.
The trail started easy, about 1000 feet along the rim. It then went down through a tunnel with switchback after switchback. It was part dirt, but mostly sandstone ledges that had been blasted and chisled from the rock wall. It is one of the most spectacular hikes we have ever been on! Near the bottom we passed through a long tunnel to be greeted by the sight of an Hogan. Smoke curled from its smokestack inviting a photograph but the sign said no photos!
After passing through the tunnel it was a short and easy stroll to the ruins. There we were greeted by quite a few Navajo Venders, selling the usual silver jewelry, pottery, and rock art. The rock art was really neat, a dancing figure, but there was no way we were going to carry it back up the cliff, (the Navajo drive the dirt trail, alongside the river to get to this spot. It can also be reached by taking a jeep tour but I strongly recommend the trail!).
We ate lunch near the ruins before beginning the hike up. There was no hurry so we took our time and made use of the benches. While we had both worried about the return it turned out to be pretty easy.

After returning to the truck it was a short drive to the Spider Rock viewpoint. Spider Rock is a sacred site of the Dine. Renita spotted ceremonial ruins near the base and I looked for a line to climb. An unforgettable tower of sandstone that seems to defy gravity!
The drive back was anticlimatic. Sliding House Ruins, Tsegi Overlook, Junction, and Tunnel were all worthy sites but we had seen too much as we stumbled from spot to spot. We returned home exhausted from the day. Clear skies.

Canyon De Chelly, The North Rim

Ya'aah'eeh. On Wednesday we left Holbrook headed toward Canyon De Chelly. The road , north of the interstate, turned into the worst road we have traveled on. When we arrived at the monument we went straight to the campground and fo9und a really good spot. Large enough, that we could park next to the fiver, allowing us to plug into our portable generator. The best thing about the campground is it is free, along with the monument. This is because it’s part of the Navajo Nation.
We rested the rest of the day, our usual routine after traveling. However we did attend a program at the campground amphitheater. There a ranger and a Navajo Musician entertained us with guitar and drum music songs and dance. It was really neat as they also interspersed their songs with stories and language of the Navajo.
The next day we got up and drove the North Rim Drive. The Canyon is actually two, Canyon De Muerto and Canyon De Chelly, which join at the park enterance. The North Rim trail has three turnoffs for viewing cliff dwellings and historic points. The Canyons starts shallow, but the walls rise quickly to over 1000 feet high. The first turnoff was closed but we were able to view the Antelope House Overlook. The second turnoff viewed Mummy Cave and Massacre Cave.
Antelope House if the biggest ruins in the park. It has about 100 rooms and kivas and was abandoned due to flash flooding, it’s pretty much at the bottom of the Canyon. Mummy cave is more spectacular and is named for the mummies found eroding from the ground beneath the ruins. It is pictured above.
Massacre Cave got its name from the massacre of 100 women and children, some older men also, who huddled in the cave as the Spanish fired round and round ricocheting them into the place where the people hid. The place is called Where Two Fell, by the Navajo. This name was given to honor the Indian Woman who grabbed a Spanish soldier and then hurling herself and him down the canyon.
We also visited the visitor center where a Hogan is constructed, that allows you to view the construction methods and the interior of an actual Hogan. They are really large and look quite comfortable! Maybe someday we will build one! Clear skies.

Petrified Forest National Park, continued

The guidebook, for the Petrified Forest, says that the best part of the park is the Long Log Trail. The authors sure got that right! For our second day at the park we walked the Long Log, Agate House, and the Giant Log trails.

The Long Log and Agate House trails are connected so you can walk both at the same stop. The Agate house was constructed of petrified wood as a pueblo for hunting parties. It is actually a reconstruction, done by the park service. The reconstruction used beautiful pieces of fossil wood and modern materials and is hardly authentic. In fairness all the wood in this location is beautiful, but the cement detracts from the structure.

The trail to the house winds among beautiful and highly agatized logs filled with multicolored agates. It screams, "Take me home, you will never be caught!" That's why the park service has a display of the 325 dollar fine for taking a small piece of wood,(We resisted the urge and purchased a cut and polished piece from Jim Greys Rock Shop, the best rock shop I have ever been in).

The long Log trail is just that, with logs of up to 100 feet in length. Once again filled with beautiful agate. One area has pieces of agate covering the ground, like the Crystal Forest used to have before visitors stole all the small and not so small pieces. As we strolled along a high school group was working on the trail, causing me to shudder and remember why I retired.

We finished both trails, about three miles, and then went to the museum and the short Giant Log trail. The trail has a self guided tour and displays the largest log in the forest, about eight feet in diameter. Nice, but a little disappointing after the Long Log Trail. We left the Park and returned home tired but glad that we had spent two days at the park. Clear skies.

Petrified Forest National Park

After arriving at Holbrook we set up camp at the Petrified Forest KOA,(Basically a gravel parking lot), and checked out the rock shops before heading to the National Park. We had planned on spending a day at the park but there was too much to see so this blog is divided into two parts. The first day, we drove to the park headquarters. From there we stopped at the North Rim Trail, Pueblo Puerco, Newspaper Rock, Blue Mesa, and the Crystal Forest.

The North Rim Trail is about .6 of a mile long and gave us our first good view of the painted desert. The rocks were horizontal layers of the Chinle formation exhibiting typical badlands topography, dendritic stream patterns, and rock bands that were colored with various shades of iron oxides. In other words a pretty desert landscape. The trail was an easy hike and was well signed with guides to the plants and wildlife.

From there we stopped at other places but the next main stop was a the Pueblo Puerco, a prehistoric 100 room pueblo. It was a nice stop with some interesting petroglyphs.

Next we stopped at Newspaper Rock, which is pictured above. It was one of our favorite stops of the day as the two large rocks are covered with petroglyphs. The cliff side reminded us of the sandstone cliffs by Devils Tower. As we viewed the petroglyphs a raven flew by clutching an unlucky lizard in it's beak.

Blue Mesa, and it's trial was a three mile loop from the main road. We really enjoyed it but didn't walk the interpretive trail as we were hungry and so we drove to the Natural Bridge, a large petrified tree, and ate lunch in the parking lot.

Our final stop of the day was at the Crystal Forest. It is an area where there are hundreds of pieces of large petrified logs. At one time the ground was covered by shards of crystals from the weathered logs but unfortunately most have been stolen by visitors. The logs that are left are some of the most beautiful we have seen. We resisted any urges to grab any ourselves, (did I mention the minimum fine of 325 bucks?), and instead took image after image of the jasper filled logs.

After returning home, we both agreed that the highlights of the day were Newspaper Rock and the Crystal Grove. We were both filled with the beauty of the place. Tomorrow it's off to the Long Log Trail! Clear skies.