2015-04-16 Cortez Colorado - Mesa Verde National Park

We left early this morning for Cortez, CO.  It was in the 30s when we woke - we had pulled in the water and sewer lines before going to bed so they wouldn't freeze and had already hooked up the Jeep.  It made our lives so much easier this AM.

Cortez is about an hour east of Monticello so we were settled in by 11AM.  Seeing we had the whole day ahead of us (and anyone who knows Vaughan knows he can't sit still) we went directly to Mesa Verde National Park.

Mesa Verde contains over 4500 archaeological sites of the Pueblo people - 600 of which are cliff dwellings.  These date from AD 550 to 1300.

The climb from the valley below to the top of the mesa was beautiful.

Spruce Tree House was one of the largest cliff dwelling villages with 130 rooms and 8 kivas (round underground chambers).

Lucky for us this was built down where you could walk up to it - most of the others you would have to repel down to.  Notice the kiva - these at one time had roofs with a hole in the top and a ladder coming through the hole.

Here is Vaughan climbing down into one that still had a roof intact.

This is Square Tower House

The next 2 photos are the remains of pithouses and pueblos built on top of the mesa.

Here are a few cliff dwellings from Sun Point View.

Notice the 2 stories on the next two.

Oak Tree House

Fire Temple (also 2 levels)

Here is a close up of Fire Temple - notice the stairs/ladder built into the side of the cliff.

Here is a distant view of Cliff House.

and now closer up

and closer yet.

Here is a video I put on youtube to give a better idea of where this is.

http://youtu.be/VfW_QKci5qY

This is House of Many Windows

After leaving Mesa Verde we drove up to Mancos and passed this pasture where the farmer had left his sprinkler system on - check out the ice sculptures. Too cool (get it - cool?).

Anyway, here is a youtube video I promised yesterday of Moki Dugway.

http://youtu.be/8mDerICSzOA