Mesa Verde National Park

It's been a while since we've posted to the travel blog, but that doesn't mean that we've been sitting around somewhere. It's just that we haven't had internet access until now. So, we'll publish a couple of updates while we're in Grants, New Mexico. Then we travel about 60 miles to Albuquerque to the Balloon Fiesta grounds. I'm sure we won't have internet access there, either, so the Balloon Fiesta posting will have to wait until we find an internet cafe or move to an RV Park with wi-fi.


On Friday, September 28th, we left Spider Rock Campground and headed for Four Corners, the only place where four states touch at the same point. From there, we headed to Mesa Verde Nat’l Park in southeastern Colorado. If you’ll look at the colored state map to the right, you’ll see that Colorado is now colored in. This is the first time we’ve had the motorhome in this beautiful state.

We stayed in a nice campground just outside the National Park. We met our good friends and fellow RV’ers, Bob & Diane in the campground as planned. We decided to go into the nearby town of Cortez for dinner. As we returned to our motorhomes, a bear ran across in front of us. It headed right into the tent camping area, but we didn’t hear any commotion from that section of the RV park, so I guess it ran right through without stopping to check garbage cans or ice chests.

On Saturday, we drove into Mesa Verde and took a half-day ranger led bus trip to a number of architectural heritage sites both atop the mesas and in the cliff dwellings below. The park includes over 4,500 archeological sites, including 600 cliff dwellings. The bus trip included stops at a number of sites. The ranger had a great background, with a degree in geology and a minor in archeology. He is a teacher in Cortez, and has spent the past seven summers as a ranger in Mesa Verde as well as participating in archeological digs in the park.

We stopped at a pit house village on the mesa top. It dates from around 750 AD, and features two Kivas, which were ceremonial rooms built underground. They were probably used for healing rites, or to pray for rain, good crops, luck in hunts, etc. The columns that extend from the wall shelf are pilasters, used to support a pole and mud roof. Entry was by ladder through a hole in the roof, which also served as a chimney for the firepit in the floor.

The highlight of the tour was a visit to Cliff Palace, the largest cliff dwelling in the park, with over 150 rooms. After viewing the dwelling from the mesa top, we climbed down a series of stone steps and wood ladders to the dwelling itself.

This ruin dates from the 1200’s and took three years to build. It is of sandstone block construction with mud mortar. Many of the rooms were used for storage, but the living areas averaged six feet by eight feet, enough room for two or three people. The people were primarily farmers, with their growing ground on the mesa top. They also hunted extensively for the game in the area. In the late 1200’s, all of the cliff dwellings were abandoned. The generally accepted reason was due to a prolonged drought that almost totally destroyed their way of life.

After viewing the ruins "up close", it was another climb up to the mesa top and our bus back to the Visitor Center. It was another great day on this trip. From here, we’re off to Durango, CO, to meet some more RV friends and to ride the Durango to Silverton narrow gauge train.

We’ll publish again when we get wi-fi access.