A Long BUMPY Ride

It's Tuesday, September 18th and I am typing this while bumping, jerking and rocking down 13 miles of washboard dirt/gravel road. We are trying to reach Chaco Culture National Historical Park with the truck and camper intact. Mark said we should never have attempted this bone-jarring road, but we've come too far to turn around now. I just reminded him we will have to do it again on our way back out . . . :) Even though we are going less than 10 mph my fingers are bouncing all over the keyboard so I have to keep backspacing and correcting! Our voices are actually vibrating when we speak. We're really not sure what we will find at the end of this road. I'll let you know when we get there if it was worth it or not!

We just saw a herd of elk grazing beside the road! Very cool! That made the trip worth it (as long as we don't get a flat tire on the way back out:)

We arrived at the visitor's center 5 minutes before they closed (5pm). It was just enough time to get a map of the park and a quick explanation of what to see. The trails and sites close at sundown (7:15pm) so we registered for a campsite and then decided to drive the Chaco Canyon Loop road and see what we could accomplish before dark.

What we found are the ruins of an ancient Indian fortified town, great houses, ceremonial "kivas", and smaller villages. It is believed that Chaco Canyon was the center of a thriving culture 1,000 years ago. . . The ceremonial, administrative and economic center of the San Juan Basin. It's an area sacred to many American Indian groups, the Pueblo people of New Mexico who are descendants of the Chacoans, but also the Hopi and the Navajo peoples.

After dark (8pm) we attended an outdoor Ranger-led lecture about the archeologists who have excavated and made discoveries here. By the end of the lecture it was pitch dark and the night sky was brilliant with stars. The evening ended with the opportunity to glimpse the night sky through two powerful telescopes.

In the morning we went back to the visitor's center to view their video and then took a couple short hikes to view more ruins. Mark asked a ranger if she drives the terrible road into the park each day, but she only does it once a week because she stays onsite. She said the road's condition varies and it happens to be at it's worst right now. Mark took some air out of the airbags for the trip back out but we didn't notice any improvement in the ride. We celebrated when we hit pavement again:)

When we left Bandelier on the way to Chaco yesterday we traveled State Rte. 4 through the Jemez Mountains and Canyon. At times in the mountains the road was narrow, steep switchbacks and we were glad we weren't pulling a trailer! At the heart of the Jemez Mountains is Valle Grande "a great valley spreading across an area that was once a massive volcanic peak" which "collapsed into itself, forming a caldera that covers 175 square miles". There is a large meadow where Rocky Mountain elk come to graze. We saw them far off in the distance. Along Rte. 4 we passed Jemez State Monument which is closed on Mondays and Tuesdays:( and also stopped to take a short hike through the woods to view Jemez Falls.

 

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