mesa verde national park

Family Time Across the Centuries

/ L. Ryan Storms / Leave a comment

Day 7: 6/8/24
Mesa Verde National Park, CO
Distance: 30-ish miles?

We wake at 7 am and head to the cliff dwelling viewing areas before the heat and the crowds. It makes for a perfect morning. Our first stop is Cliff Palace. When we get to the viewing platform, our eyes are immediately drawn to a carved out dwelling across the canyon. “Is that it?” Husband asks, prepared to be underwhelmed. “It’s hardly anything,” one of the children chirp.

I turn to my left and before me is the incredible sight that we came for – Cliff Palace, a pueblo dwelling in the canyon walls, the very existence of which seems impossible. “That’s because you’re looking the wrong direction.” I say, and everyone turns to see what I’ve been staring at. It’s enough to take your breath away, this incredible feat. How were such places built? How were such things *possible?* These dwellings are 1000 years old and older. It’s incredible to think how they were made, and how many Indigenous families must have climbed up and down those cliffs with nothing but ladders and hand and footholds? How many families spent hours and days together in these shared rooms, bonding over stories and work and time together?

We take a stop to check out The House of Many Windows, which we think sounds both like a mystical place and a horror movie — depends on who you ask within our party. The “windows” are actually doors, and only 4 of the original 15 are able to be seen today. Our next stop is Balcony House, which requires a 1.2 mile walk to view from afar. It’s early enough that we see next to no one along the partially-shaded trail. This hike is *much* better than yesterday’s. The Balcony House parking lot is located directly above Balcony House, leading to a lot of confusion among many of the tourists now behind us on their way to view the dwellings, but last night’s ranger talk included instructions on the best way to view some of the sites, so we were prepared.

Then we swing by the museum to see some artifacts once found inside the dwellings and to pick up stickers for the roof box. We’ve been slowly adding as we go and loving the accumulating adventure. Our final stop is a quick view from directly behind the museum — Spruce Tree House. A raven nest sits directly above Spruce Tree House, and the couple are home and keeping their young warm.

We head back to camp for showers, laundry, and internet. A trip to the local town for groceries while the sun is high and hot, then back to the tent for working on photos and art and for maybe (definitely) catching a nap before getting dinner and watching a deer in the meadow beside us.

We pass the evening playing Toasted or Roasted (a game we picked up at the Grand Canyon 9 years ago) and the Oregon Trail card game. Spoiler: Only one of us (Older Child) made it to Oregon. Younger Child died from a rattlesnake bite about 10% of the way into the game. Husband died of dysentery about 40% of the way through. And I died of dysentery 92% of the way into the game.

We laughed and laughed. And we’re really, really glad not to be on the *actual* Oregon Trail. I like our Subaru, thank you very much. It’s been a good trip so far. We may not live in cliff dwellings like the Indigenous people a thousand years ago, but this trip is a treasure for our close-knit family.

Into the Fire

/ L. Ryan Storms / Leave a comment

Day 6: 6/7/24
From: Santa Fe, NM
To: Mesa Verde National Park, CO by way of Bisti/De-Na-Zin Wilderness Area, NM
Distance: 318 miles

Up at 7, but Husband was up half the night with a migraine brought on by the IPA he had with his shrimp tacos last night. Maybe there’s some obscure rule that says we can’t *all* get good sleep at the same time. Because I slept like a baby. It was amazing.

We head to the breakfast buffet at the inn, which is delicious and loaded with an array of southwestern goodies. Pinto beans, mixed veggies, chili, plus your regular fare like eggs, biscuits and gravy, fresh fruit, cereal, pastries, and oatmeal. We eat in the beautiful courtyard where I’ve decided I’d like to set up permanent residence.

Then we’re on the road to Cabela’s for a seamless pickup of the air mat I ordered yesterday. Mat in hand, we head northward to the Bisti/De-Na-Zin Wilderness Area, the land changes drastically again. We drive through several reservations which are nothing more than rock, dirt, and scrub brush from the road. Breathtaking and lonesome.

Along the way, we pass someone in the desert who’s riding a bike loaded with supplies. “Where is he going?” I ask. “Where is he *coming* from???” He’s coming from the same whole lot of nowhere we just came from. I can’t imagine riding a bike on a desert highway. We soon figure out he’s heading towards the town of Cuba, NM just a few miles down the road.

By the time we’re 45 minutes from our destination, the surrounding land is low grass and scrub. Younger Child says it’s “Minecraft terrain.” Indeed. A half hour out and we start pointing out angry alien faces in rocks. 

We travel twelve miles down a dirt and gravel road to the Bisti/De-Na-Zin Wilderness Area and park, load up on sunscreen and water, and head out into the wilderness in hopes of seeing this:

What we didn’t plan on: Being there at the beginning of the hottest part of the day, there being NO maps at all of the trails, and the distance would would have to travel to see what we were hoping to see. 

So in the end, we didn’t see it. But we still walked 2 miles in blistering heat with no shade and got some cool pictures regardless, plus saw 75 million year old petrified wood. Still, everyone is surely wondering what Mom was thinking putting this one on our list, but when Mom planned this in January, it wasn’t a real feel temperature of 100 degrees.

We get back to the car, down more water, and blast the A/C for the next hour, stopping at lunchtime not to eat lunch, but to eat ice cream at a gas station. Because ice cream is the only food that even remotely sounds good right now. 3/4 of us have heat-related headaches. Older Child says Dad must have played his headache card last night.

We did get to see some horses in the wilderness area. Wild? Or Navajo owned? We don’t know. And without cell service, we can’t find out…

Older Child and I drank several bottles of water to try to get rid of the heat headaches…and found out later we both desperately had to visit a restroom but there’s nothing nearby. It was a fun hour.

We got to Morefield Campground in Mesa Verde National Park and were immediately greeted with stunning 360 degree views. There is no direction that isn’t incredible.

A short time later, we set up camp in a beautiful site with sun and shade and trees. A gust of wind tries to take our tent away before we have it staked down, but we hold on.

Minutes after we arrive, both kids are approached by a kid from another camp site who asks if they want to play tag with him. They help us finish setting up and then head over to play for a half hour before dinner. Older Child jokes they want to play snake tag, where you run around in the grass with no shoes on and see who gets bitten by a snake first. Yes, my kids are weird. They ended up not playing any kind of tag, snake or otherwise. Instead, they played Mancala and lost twice to an 11-year-old named Caleb.

A quick camp meal and some local exploring for Husband and kids, while I play with photos on my computer at the camp picnic table and receive a visit from a sweet black-tailed doe. At 9, we head to the amphitheater for a presentation by a park ranger about some of the animals in the park.

When we get back to our campsite, Mom makes another *very* bad decision. Older child is concerned about a noise in the grass and trees behind our tent so I take a flashlight behind to look and then fake freaking out at a bear. The kids *lose* it and it’s a mixture of laughter and tears for the next hour as adrenaline clears system. I am an awful mother. This is the kind of prank their dad would pull, not me… I may never get over feeling guilty over this one.

To try to ease the tension, I pull out my camera and show the kids the earth’s rotation by focusing on the North Star and keeping the shutter open to create star trails. They are intrigued and we agree we’ll try it again tomorrow night with a little more preparation beforehand.

For now, bed. An early wake up so we can head out to see the Pueblo dwellings along the mountain in the morning. Animals are also most active early in the morning, so who knows? If we’re lucky, maybe we’ll see a bear on the way…