Mesa Verde National Park is another one of those I-had-no-idea-I-would-be-so-impressed-with-this-park experiences. If any snobby foreigner says the U.S. has no culture or anything older than 200-years-old just point them here! This park has an awesome winding scenic drive and several panoramic views of the hundreds of cliff dwellings made by the ancient Pueblo Native Americans. With 5,0000 archeological sites and almost 600 uncovered cliff dwellings, there is a lot to explore here.
We got to the visitor center early after staying at another great Harvest Hosts location (Mancos Brewing Company) so we could purchase tours of the cliff dwellings for the same day. I was thinking of being ambitious and doing all three of the tours they were currently offering but given the timing we settled on two, the Balcony House tour and the Cliff Palace tour. It’s important to book your tours earlier in the day because the morning tours book up fast and it gets HOT by noon in the summer time.
We left Rocky in the air-conditioned RV with the generator going at the visitor center and boarded our scooters to chug up the mesas. Side note: we’ve already put almost 1000 miles on those babies! Several signs warned you not to stop given the unstable nature of the mesas and the high probability of rockfall. Fortunately we didn’t run into this as we zoomed up 23 miles to the Cliff Palace Loop.
Our tour of the Balcony House started at 10:00 a.m. and is labeled as the most adventurous cliff dwelling tour as you have to climb a 32-foot ladder to enter and then crawl through a 12-foot long and 18-inch wide tunnel, climb up a 60-foot open cliff face and two 10-foot ladders to exit. Our tour guides for both cliff dwellings were a little “off” and I attributed this to the pothead culture of Colorado. It was an amusing climb and tour nonetheless and we definitely got a good work-out in.
As we looked out at the neighboring mesas we thought, “Why would anyone live here?” I mean, the view is beautiful and it is like a super-secret play house but to live and work and farm this land seemed like a crazy endeavor.
We learned that the Puebloans’ life expectancy was in the 30s as they farmed on the mesa tops and sometimes grew potatoes in the valley. They collected water from a water seep that drained from the rocks after the snow and rain soaked through and balanced the water on their heads as they scaled the narrow cliffs.
There was a 25-year famine at the end of the 13th century and overpopulation (over 5,0000 thought to be in the area) that are cited reasons for why they eventually migrated south. People were tiny as evidenced by the small rooms and the narrow tunnel we had to crawl through to get out. They estimate that up to 30 people lived at the Balcony House.
After contemplating what life would be like here as we looked out over the Soda Canyon, we made the adventurous journey to get out. Very interesting that people did this on the daily – without the safety rails!
Our next stop was the Soda Canyon Overlook hike which afforded great view of Balcony House and the canyon, giving us a more vivid view of what the surroundings looked like for the ancient inhabitants.
We made our way to the Chapin Mesa Archeological Museum which had a short video on the area and was full of neat artifacts that were unearthed when this place was discovered in the late 19th century. I’m glad Teddy Roosevelt set aside this land to be preserved as a park in 1906 after a lot of the artifacts were pilfered and sold. Interesting dioramas made in the 1950s lined one wall.
It was then time for our Cliff Palace tour which is the largest cliff dwelling found in North America and thought to have been home of 100 or more people. The journey to the brick houses/apartments was not as strenuous as the Balcony House but still precarious. Visiting this place reminded me of the various Native American Houses I made in grade-school such as the wigwams, tee-pees and Puebloen brick houses. Fortunately the ranger talked to us while we were hanging out in the shade.
The Kiva below was a ceremonial circular structure in the compound which they also used to keep warm on cold winter nights.
After our second tour, we drove around the Mesa Loop road and stopped at a few of the overlooks to see more of the ancient artifacts including the opposite side of the canyon from Cliff Palace.
Definitely a must-see park if you have any interest in Native American history or just want to see what it’s like driving up a huge mesa. It was interesting to hear all the foreign tongues here (more so than any other park up to this point) and learn that this is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. I know that I was definitely impacted contemplating living in such a unique and challenging location. I do know that they were my kind of people though – everyday was an adventure! My husband also thought it was A-mesa-ing!
Class C M.D. 