On June 29, 1906, President Theodore Roosevelt established Mesa Verde National Park to "preserve the works of man". He did so because of the cliff dwellings and the mesa top sites of pithouses, pueblos, masonry towers, and farming structures left behind by the Ancestral Puebloans. These people inhabited this Southern Colorado landscape for roughly 700 years. (The USA is only about 234 years of age) Ancestral Puebloans made Mesa Verde their home from roughly A.D. 550 to 1300 and contrary to popular belief, they did not disappear but rather moved to Arizona where their decedents sill live today. By no means am I a credible history expert on Ancient Puebloans, but our tour guide was, and since this isn't a college essay, I will not be citing him in my MLA format bibliography at the end of the post, but I did use his words almost verbatim. Our tour guide took us down to the famous "Cliff Palace". He explained that we were viewing ancient structures, but also a sacred burial ground where many of the ancient people passed on due to draught and/or disease (Mostly Children). He encouraged us to imagine the Puebloans and how they would have lived and interacted within the dwellings and hoped that we would leave Mesa Verde with a better appreciation of the structures and the people. We did. Below are pictures from the "Palace".
Joe also got a great shot of "Soda Canyon" with the Rockies in the background.
Today was a good day, but the hours of driving have finally caught up to us. By 2pm Joe and I were truly exhausted (I have misused this word too many times) and decided to pop into a local restaurant for an early dinner. After dinner, we got back to our campsite, took showers, did laundry, and cleaned out the car. It is currently about 9:30pm mountain time (2 hours earlier than Eastern Standard) and we are planning on going to sleep soon. We will be waking up at 3:30am and heading back on the road to pass thru Monument Valley, Utah as the sun rises. It may truly be a "once in a lifetime" experience and will make for remarkable photos. Once we pass through Monment Valley, our next destination is the Grand Canyon in Arizona. Neither of us have seen the Canyon so we are looking forward. We will be staying at the Grand Canyon for two nights and plan to complete a full day hike of one of the Canyon Rims. You should be hearing from me tomorrow night with some more photos.
Below is a google map image of our current location.
Vin
See details(Google Map)
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