Mesa Verde Colorado

13 July 2000

From Ogden we took I-15 down to Spanish Fork Utah and took Highway 6 down to cut across to east bound I-70. Great drive through the interior of Utah. I'm convinced that they filmed that car commercial along this stretch of road. You know the one where the guy sees this car trying to pass him up and he tries to tear out ahead of it and it's coming up behind him and he says, "I don't believe this! Are you crazy man?"
And he pulls over and yells, "Who are you?"
But the couple in the car isn't even paying attention and the girl says, "What's wrong with that guy?" And the guy says, "Beats me."
That stretch of road looks like the one we drive down to get to I-70.
Once we got to I-70 and started heading east we took the exit to go south to Moab Utah.
We had taken a trip through Moab and Arches National Park in July of 1999. Another 100 miles we got over the border and into Cortez Colorado.

Now, if you ever get the chance to get to Cortez Colorado, the place you want to stay is the "Horizon Western Inn". We got a Great Big suite with a refrigerator and microwave. A living room and separate bed room. It had a BIG indoor jet pool and pretty big spread for the free continental breakfast.

Places we ate at in Cortez:

  1. Francisco's Mexican Restaurant. Really nice place. Good kids menu. The salsa for the free basket of chips only had two kinds... Hot and "Outta Control Hot." If you ask them if they have any salsa for wimpy gringos they look at you like it's a stupid question. "No. We certainly do not."
    I had the Taco Salad. Real Good.
  2. Sonic Burger. We don't have Sonic Burger in Utah and I really like their fruit flavored slushies. They make them with real pieces of fruit in them.
  3. Denny's. It was a "Diner" style Denny's. Noisey. Slow service and pretty bad sandwiches.
    A blight upon the otherwise high standard of Denny's.

Cortez was a pretty nice town. Very "Southwest" looking. Adobe looking walls. Red tile roofs. Indians walking around everywhere.
Really nice bookstore/coffee shops all around too.
I liked it.
The next day we got started with our dirty "tourist" work.
Since it was the furthest away (30 miles) of the two things we came to see, we went down to "Four Corners".  This is the only spot in the country where four states, (Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona) meet.

You can, (and we did), stand on four states at the same time.

But... There are a couple things that are going to keep you from doing this,

  1. The Navaho Nation.  You have to pay to get to the site of the Four Corners.  And it's six bucks a car load.  And it's payable to the Navaho Nation because the site where the four corners of the states meet is on an Indian Reservation.  Pay back's a...
  2. All the other people that want to stand in four states simultaneously just like you.  There is no order or line at this place.  They have a raised platform and intersecting lines to show where the state borders are, and a plaque that says, "Yep.  Four states meet here.  Cool huh?"
    But there's no "line" or "etiquette" for going up to the intersection to get a picture of yourself.  You just stand there and when you figure you're "next" you just walk up there and get your wife or friend to take your picture.  
    And you feel like a total dork because you want to do something goofy like lay down and spread you arms and legs out into  all four states but you got quite a crowd here watching you and that kinda kills your artistic license.
    If you were to go up to the Navahos running the snack bar or selling silver turquoise belt buckles that, "Hey.  How 'bout getting an organized line going on for this thing?"
    They'd just say, "Lines?  Oh, we can not have "lines".  It is not 'Our Way'. *smirk*"

Uh, huh.  Tell me who won the war.

We hung around there for around an hour looking at the jewelry.

Then we had to go back through Cortez to get to Mesa Verde National Park which is around eight miles from Cortez.

There's a real problem with the park that I need to talk about.

The whole point of the park is that they have these ruins of villages, made of stone, in the sides of cliffs.  The people that made these villages were called the "Anasazi" which means "Ancient Enemy" in the language of the Ute.  (The friendly folks who gave us the name "Utah" for the state next door.)

Around the year 1200 the villages were deserted.  Nobody is quite sure why but there are a bunch of darn good theories.

  1. The only reason they came there in the first place was to be down closer to the water during times of drought.  When the drought ended they went back to living on top of the mesas.  (Table top plains)
  2. They were encroaching on the lands of the Navahos, Utes, and other Pueblo tribes.  They were not welcome so they bolted.
  3. Living in a cave alcove sucks!  You'd think it would be cool but it's not.  You can't have a descent garden to grow enough food and besides the cave in.

There are several different villages build into the cliffs at different locations throughout the park.  None of them had been inhabited on a continual basis for more than 75 to 100 years tops!  After they were deserted the only people that came by did so to use the "Kevas".  (Ritual cells that you climbed down into by ladder.  I guess you'd sit down there and eat peyote and talk to Jim Morrison.)

So there are several different sites that have these villages in the cliffs.  All but one require tickets to get in to see.

Mesa Verde National Park

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