Wonders of the American West

Day Four – 1 June 2011

Mesa Verde – Monument Valley

Weather: Cloudy, 22-30

I wasn’t out cold last night. I was in a coma. Gordon said we’d sleep better at that altitude and boy was he right. Since the hotel didn’t have a restaurant, we boarded the bus with everything and went to the visitor centre for breakfast at a cafeteria type restaurant, complete with gift shop.

We could get a breakfast burrito with all the fixings, but my stomach was feeling just slightly queasy.

So I had eggs.

And it helped. I checked out the gift shop and bought a hat. We boarded the bus for Mesa Verde by nine and first made some quick photo stops.

Mesa Verde is the first National Park dedicated to the accomplishments of man rather than natural beauty. Not that it was lacking that. The Mesa sits at about eight thousand feet and was covered in pine and other semi arid vegetation – enough to make it look much greener than the nearby regions. Sections had been damaged from a large forest fire a few years ago.

Our first stop was to an overlook at the Navajo Canyon. It was a short walk down a paved path to where we could see the Square Tower House tucked in below us.

Then we made several more stops to see the ruins of kivas and pithouses. The kiva were round spiritual rooms complete with a fire pit in the centre (and there would have been a hole in the top to let out the smoke). There was also a ventilation shaft with a deflecting stone at the base so that the air didn’t blow the smoke all around the room.

The pit houses were dug into the earth but eventually replaced with above ground homes because the wood used to make the roofs could burn, and of course, anyone inside would be trapped.

After this, we moved on to a natural overlook with stairs cut out of the rock. From there, we could see several settlements built into the rock – almost all far enough into the rock alcove to afford them protection from the elements.

Gordon said they did their farming on the mesa and the food was brought down.

By the women. Of course.

The last stop was to visit Spruce Tree House. This settlement contained 147 rooms and housed about a hundred people and included eight kivas. It was called the Spruce Tree House because the original explorers who found it had to climb down a tree to get to it. Today, they are convinced it wasn’t a spruce tree, but a pine tree.

The settlement was located in a narrow steep canyon. Walking down wasn’t a problem. Walking back up took a little longer.

Two rangers were at the settlement to answer questions. Most of the settlement was roped off so that you couldn’t climb over everything, but one pit house was restored and we could climb down the short ladder to check out a room no bigger than my den. The interlacing wood logs that made the ceiling were very interesting.

After the slow walk back up (remember, we were at about seven thousand feet), we checked out the gift shop then had an ice cream on the patio.

Gordon picked us up and we headed down the Mesa. He said he was very happy that Anson had had a good night’s sleep. They don’t let trucks or trailers up the curving roads on the Mesa for safety reasons.

But they let buses up.

We went to Cortez for lunch and stopped at a strip mall where we could go to Dairy Queen, Pizza Hut or a couple of other places. I had a burger and we were off by one.

The first stop was the weigh scales where our bus was pulled over for paperwork inspection. Anson was in there for what seemed like a long time and then he rushed out looking worried, grabbed more paperwork and ran back in.

I considered taking up a collection for bail.

It took about thirty minutes and he had to pay $35 as he was missing one piece of paperwork, but had the sticker.

Then we crossed into Arizona and guess what? Yup. We had to pull into another weigh scales. Anson had to go in to see them and again he was in there for what seemed like a long time. He even rushed out to grab more paperwork.

I considered skipping the bail and collecting bribe money.

He was done about fifteen minutes later.

We were on our way again and Gordon mentioned the Four Corners which was not on our itinerary. I had asked about it when I saw that our route was on a road to the north. I thought he might have changed our route to the southern Arizona route so that we could drive by the Four Corners.

We couldn’t go in since there were permits and tickets to be bought and it wasn’t part of the tour. So, we stopped, snapped a pic of the sign and carried on.

Turned out that Anson had missed the turn off for the northern route into the park, so we took the southern route. Gordon said it didn’t matter either way. The southern route was longer but the road was a bit faster.

This area was Navajo territory and covered about sixteen million acres (the size of West Virginia). We stopped in the town of Kyenta for a break and Gordon showed us to the Code Talkers display in the Burger King. Pretty interesting.

It didn’t take long to get to Monument Valley. Our hotel was called The View.

Now, if anyone has read my Greece tale, they know that the Greeks have a lot of hotels called palaces. And in some cases, they were anything but.

Well, when Americans call something The View, it has a damned good view.

The hotel was on the edge of the valley overlooking the famous buttes. All the rooms faced the valley and the hotel was built to blend in with the surroundings. Look closely at this photo.

We got to our rooms and the luggage delivery was quite prompt. We had only an hour to get ready for the Navajo dinner down in the valley. The nearby hotel called Gouldings (a place almost hundred years old that was partially responsible for getting Hollywood interested in the valley) was the place that has the best all-terrain vehicle rides into the valley. Gordon didn’t recommend the local guides who were parked outside our hotel.

It was a short drive to Goulding’s and we boarded two vehicles. They were just really big pickups with seating for twenty in the back. They drove us back towards The View and then we turned off into the valley. The road was bumpy but the driver stopped from time to time so that we could get some pics.

The sun was about two hours from setting and started to peak through the clouds.

After a thirty minute drive, we stopped at a spot with picnic tables and an outdoor kitchen where our chicken, Navajo taco and salads were being made.

The wind kept blowing the dust everywhere, but the meal was excellent. They even gave the chicken people a sample of the deep fried bread in the Navajo taco.

Beaver tail without the powdered sugar. Delicious.

Then the setting sun struck the monuments.

Well, you want to see thirty people abandon dinner in an instant. It didn’t last long but we got some great shots. Then one of the Navajo guides sang a couple of songs while keeping tune with a small hand drum. Very nice.

Two other trucks showed up with the group for the next meal, so we were ushered back into our vehicles and taken to John Ford Point. He was the famous director who fell in love with Monument Valley and made a lot of movies here like Stagecoach and The Searchers.

This spot was one of the best with views of at least four buttes.

There was a sign that said $2.00 for a photo with horse, but we didn’t see a horse.

Must be an invisible horse.

As we made our way back to the hotel, the sun hit some of the closer buttes and again the driver stopped so that we could get pics. Overall, an awesome experience!

We got back to the hotel just in time to catch the gift shop before it closed.