Day 4 October 9, 2021
Mesa Verde is pretty magical. Part of the wonder is the sheer improbability of it existing.
Like Natives all across the continent, people settled in the Mesa Verde area and combined hunting, foraging, and agriculture to support growing communities. By around 650 CE they were building pueblos with extended family groups on the mesa tops.
Then – for reasons unknown – around the 1100s they moved down onto cliff shelves, building sometimes elaborate pueblos in niches along the canyons. Living away from the fields and hunting above and the water below required a lot more effort. Maneuvering by ladders and carved hand- and footholds in the rock was demanding.
Less than 200 years later... they abandoned the cliff dwellings and migrated to other areas. The Hopi, Zuni, and New Mexico pueblo Indians all trace their heritage to the Ancestral Puebloans.
Bewildering... mysterious... and beautiful. Working with stone and brick, they did not stick to rectangles. Curves were common and the sacred centers, the kivas, were round. This mix of multiplemlayers and angles and curves resulted in elegant structures that even as ruins continue to amaze the eye and imagination.
Today one can still imagine the astonishment of a couple cowboys in 1888 tracking down stray cattle in the winding canyons with massive sandstone niches and starting to see remnants of small structures... often granaries for storing food...
and then rounding a corner to find the abandoned remnants of a massive pueblo.
This cliff dwelling was dubbed “Spruce Tree House” by the people who re-discovered the wonders of Mesa Verde. It had about 130 rooms and 8 kivas. It was constructed in a fairly short time frame – 1211-1278 – then abandoned only a few years later.
We might be tempted to consider these constructions “primitive” but one only needs to look at the modern structures of Mesa Verde and the rapid deterioration brought on by the harsh climate to realize how remarkable these thousand year-old structures really are. In less than 100 years, the “modern” buildings at Mesa Verde require constant refurbishment.
Enough talk... the pictures speak for themselves... even with the road and building closures, the ever-changing light and vistas speak directly to one's soul, worthy of months rather than just a few hours to take it all in. The Idiots worked The Beast into a perfect parking spot gazing out on Cliff Palace and made some lunch... played some pinochle... and immersed themselves in the wonder..
Note the hand/footholds carved into the rock to provide access by ladder and climbing between the upper and lower niches...
It can be difficult to spot wildlife in late fall in Mesa Verde – but one can always expect to see flocks of migrating Polarfleeced Gawkers...
