We just left Mesa Verde yesterday after camping in the mountains for two days. Every turn of a corner reveals even more breathtaking views than the last. We visited the highest spot in that park on Friday, which is amazing for two reasons, the first is that it was the very highest elevation that we will be on this entire trip (unless I can get Tony to go mountain climbing on this trip. Ha ha), a great contrast to today as we entered Zion National Park, the lowest elevation on this trip. The second reason that it was so amazing was that it offered a 360 degree view of the park and surrounding area.
There are two mountains that one can see from practically everywhere in the park. I became, admittedly, a bit obsessed with them. Every time we passed them, could see them from an over look, or saw the names of the mountains I would exclaim," Look it's Shiprock!" or, "Aww, It's Sleeping Ute!" What makes this even more silly is the fact that these formations are not the main drawl of the park at all! Mesa Verde is famous for the incredibly well intact homes of peoples living within the steep, rocky area ranging from around 600AD through 1300 AD including cliff Dwellings.
We walked around many of the archaeological sites. We visited the museum and learned about how these native peoples lived and evolved. Many of the mystery of the buildings lays with the confusion about why these people moved to the edges of cliffs. Tony and I looked at each other, awe struck, and came to one simple conclusion. They were nuts! The ledges and rocks that would have been climbed on a regular basis just to perform everyday activities was astonishing. As we looked shakily over equalvallent heights from across a casum, it was clear to us that the people living there were much much braver than us!
We left beautiful Mesa Verde yesterday, drove to Four Corners Monument, realized we didn't have the six dollars in cash to get in and had to drive 25 minutes in the middle of the Navajo Reservation to find an ATM. Then we turned around and drove back just to spend a cool ten minutes there. All of this after a limited amount of sleep for both of us because the mule dear are fearless and like to play tag in the camp sites at night, and the close quarters of the campground made our neighbors loud, gruff snoring sound like a bears deep growl. (While there are black bears living in the park, we we probably not in any real danger because of the large amount of people. However, although we both knew this It was enough to keep us both up and jumpy!) It is literally a monument in the middle of booths on every side with natives selling post cards, tee shirts, and tons of turqouse jewelry. We stayed long enough to take a picture, sighed and left unsatisfied that the 6 dollars plus a hours worth of gas had been well spent.
We met our host for the night, Willy, who lives in a tiny town called Big Water, Population 400. Willy interested us from the very get go. He is the former Mayor of Big Water and was the first openly gay Mayor in Utah! As soon as we arrived he took us on a tour of his town. What a diverse and interesting town it turned out to be! There were polygamist, each wife living in a separate home and an incredible little museum and welcome center. We were given a fantastic little lecture at the museum about the numerous archaeological finds found with in yards of the museum and with in the the Grand stair case- Escelante. Did you know that the middle of the continent was once part of the ocean floor. We didn't but it was very cool. We also saw a house that is completely off the grid. We would have passed Big Water. We're glad we didn't!
Now we are in Zion! It's picture-esque. We'll be hiking and exploring for the next few days. And then we're off to The Grand Canyon!
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