Luckily we had reserved two nights in the park hotel but the next morning we ventured to breakfast and the visitor's center to see if we'd be able to see anything!
Walking to the visitor center... maybe?
Ah, yes, the grandest view at the Visitor Center, isn't it?
Okay truth be told, I was laughing at this photo and thought, oh boy we aren't going to see anything but then the Park Ranger said we were at 8500 ft and currently at the bottom of a cloud? (So Cyndi, I guess that means we got to get out and play in the cloud!)
We started down and while the sky was nearly pure white, the fog lifted and we toured the first of a series of pueblos called Far View communities. In fact, this stop turned out to be quite amazing. The kids were even allowed to explore parts of the pueblo ruins.
Here they peek out from Coyote Village.
This is where it got amazing. We went to the second visitor center and museum to pick up the Jr. Park Ranger activity guide, and started towards our first cliff dwelling - the Spruce Tree House!
Jaiden climbing into a kiva... love the stance of Alyssa and expressions of the people around him?!
There goes Alyssa inside!
still at the Spruce Tree House. The kids explored where they could and even tried a hand at grinding corn... at least pretend corn but a real metate!
Looking back into the Spruce Tree House.
Then we decided to go on a hike to see some petroglyphs. The walk was amazing, lots of BIG rocks, narrow passageways, through the canyon. We never made it to the petroglyphs - Dennis remembered better than I that this was really a long hike.
But we had fun exploring the "swiss cheese" rocks including Alyssa's bear!
and attempted a family portrait.
We then drove along the 6 mile road and explored all sorts of villages and pithouses. I love when Jaiden gets intense on photographing too. I think these are the sweetest photos even when the lighting is kind of wonky like this one is.
Looking down on Square Tower House. This was stunning to look at. We were quite high above it but it was remarkable how when the light changed, this pueblo became completely hidden.
This photo is blurry (sorry) and not composed quite how I wanted but I include it because it's the only one I have and I love the way the two of them are staring out across the canyon at our first views of Cliff Palace and the Balcony House (the infamous pueblos or at least most well known publicly of Mesa Verde).
View of Cliff Palace.
I thought I had included the view of Balcony House but then I realized it was Cliff Palace and since I am up to 15 images, I will spare you one more!
One of the many canyons where these pueblos are hidden.
Dennis and I have been to many pueblos throughout Arizona, New Mexico and now Colorado and the one thing that always strikes me is how this is the canyon, and without getting a chance to explore these canyons, many of these pueblos would go unnoticed and probably never found. For all we know, there may be a few more hidden among these canyon walls.
The kids enjoyed this immensely. And for a long weekend, it was a fantastic trip. I'd love to come back and actually go into the Cliff Palace and Balcony House, however, Dennis was (and is) still recovering from his back issue so I wasn't about to sign us all up for a strenuous hike into those two dwellings. In hindsight, I guess I could have had him wait in the car but that just didn't the same especially since half the fun is experiencing the kid's reactions to these magnificent places.
