Spruce Tree House, Mesa Verde

     We got ourselves moving early today so that we could take the hike down to Spruce Tree House.  This cliff dwelling is one of the largest in the park and may have had 60 to 80 people living in about 130 rooms which are situated under a huge sandstone overhang.  It faces west and in the afternoon the trail down and the dwelling are both in full sun.  This morning it was in full shade.  We walked down slowly and enjoyed the many shrubs and wildflowers along the trail.  Once we reached the village we were in cool shade and could enjoy the amazing buildings which have stood here since the 1200's.  It was very quiet and I could really imagine what it would have been like to live in this community.

    A couple of kids were exploring the site and had dozens of questions.  They wanted to walk around the buildings.  The kids asked if they could climb into a tower. One Ranger asked another,"Did you clear out all the snakes this morning?"  "Yes," she answered, "I think that I got them all out."  The kids went in, carefully.  Rangers said that they have many options for encouraging kids to take it easy on the fragile ruins.
    We left Spruce Tree and drove out to Wetherill Mesa which is much less visited.  It is about a 20 mile drive up and down hills to get to up onto the high section of this mesa.  A tram took us out to overlooks where we could see several more huge cliff dwellings.  Long House is another large site which has tours.  This tour requires a hike down 130 feet and then climbing down two fifteen foot ladders to the site.  Once you are down, you have to get back up again.  We looked at it from afar as it was in the 90's again this afternoon.  I keep wondering why the people settled so high in such a difficult place to get to.

Proof that I made the hike down to the dwelling

    Usually we like to have breakfast or lunch at the dining room of the national park lodge.  However, Far View lodge is mostly a set of 1960 era motel buildings.  Nothing very impressive.  We ate at the Far View Terrace cafeteria and I had some delicious Navajo tacos.  Yum.
    The hiking and the heat wiped us out so we went back to relax at the camper.  It was so hot, even under the nice shady oaks that we retreated inside and turned on our generator for an hour of air conditioning.  It is so nice to be able to do this - even when we had the generator on the 5th Wheel we couldn't run the air.  By dinner time the breeze came up and we went out again to enjoy the evening.  Lots of Germans in the campground driving rented RV's.  Mesa Verde must be big on the list of places to see for international visitors.  There was a bus load of Japanese folks and another of French at the Visitor Center.  We think about how immense this empty desert must seem to folks who live in lands that are so heavily populated.