Day 173 Bloomfield - New Mexico
Trip Start
May 07, 2008
1
184
205
Trip End
Nov 22, 2008
Bloomfield,
New Mexico,
United States
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Yes we are still in the same place, yet we covered a lot of territory today.
Unable to hire a car, being a Sunday here, we headed out to the Aztec ruins first up, with the knowledge The Castle would have no problem.
Only a few miles down the road and we found our way to the National Historic site. Great! our National pass works yet again.
We were also treated to a pleasure of having a guide give us a talk.
The young lady was obtaining an "Interpretive Guide Certificate" this was a presentation about the ruins done in front of a video camera for her assessment. How Lucky are the travellers? It was a very informative presentation about the ancient ruins and the National Parks control in preserving or restoring these past historic sites.
These ruins are a misnomer, as mentioned in the last report. These were built by the Pueblo Natives and were similar to the Aztec architecture, so when found, they received this name. With further research and further understanding the real development and builders were unearthed.
The Kiva (round room used for religious and ceremonial occasions) has been restored back in 1936.
After the presentation, we did the self walk tour, to explore the ruins and absorb the skills and challenge to build this structure back in 1100ad. We took in the 25 minute movie presentation to explain the history and discoverer, coupled with the archaeological dig to bring this to surface for people to enjoy and marvel. Truly a great experience.
We asked the question about the road into the other ruins of the pueblo ruins called, Chaco culture National Historic park.
The road would take the Castle, BUT! It was rough and to drive slow in parts. Hey undaunted, the Travellers had been everywhere man, so this wasn't going to stop us.
Away we go but stopping at the Safeway on the way to have morning tea and fill up before embarking on the trip(around 1 hour back along the track we took arriving in town.)
With a Starbucks under our belt and morning tea we set sail to follow the historic path.
Turning off the main road and heading into the National Park, the first part of the road was sealed and this lulled us into a sense of comfort.
The paved road ran out and we hit the dirt road, in a manner of speaking we really HIT the dirt road.
This has to go into the records as the worst road travelled on our journey.
The dirt road was a corrugated wash board of shocking vibrations that created a shudder right through the Castle. Every cupboard and part in the Castle just rattled and shuddered, as well as the travellers were all shook up, and NOT by Elvis!
After about 4-5 miles of dodging from side to side, in an attempt to find a smooth portion of road, the question was asked about turning back. The best speed we could achieve was 10-12 mph, and this was still jaw breaking at times.
We figured we must be halfway so keep going, after what felt an interminable period of travel we came to the gates to the National park, AND paved road. The relief felt by the travellers was palpable. The next 2.5 miles was a great run to the Information centre, it allowed us to resettle our internal organs back into some type of correct arrangement.
Again the information centre was very helpful and was running a movie about this area.
This area was the original centre of the development of the Pueblo Natives from being nomadic fossickers to settling and becoming farmers, as well as became builders/engineers and architects.
The beginning buildings were started around 800AD, they continued the building up until 1300Ad. This developed a series of up to 35 communities in the Chaco Canyon, with the main gathering site and buildings was developed to house 600 rooms.
After the movie we hit the road again to travel the circular paved road to take in the different sites.
The first one we chose was the main building site of 600 rooms.
It was an amazing structure and even though started with a smaller design the added development, continued to grow as per the original design.
Research has shown the other ruins in other areas were developed along the same design, including the "Aztec Ruins" we had earlier toured.
The amazing thing about this development and culture, they developed and were built over a period of 300 years, then the culture moved on. According to the present day Pueblo Natives, in their traditional songs and stories, they were told to move and split into four parts and head North/South/East/West, this also matches with some earlier ruins we visited back in MMMMMM.
Some of the Pueblo Natives are still in existence and have different tribes or names. One being the Hopi Indians, they continue a lot of the traditional customs and also object to photos being taken of themselves and tribal area.
This whole Canyon and historic reverent site is in the Navajo Native Reservation. The Navajo are not direct descendents of the Pueblo Indians, but certainly have many of the cultures and systems either adopted or passed on to them of a similar or of the same nature.
We tracked around the largest site and enjoyed the time to wonder at the skills and time taken to develop this wonderful building as early cultures developed.
We moved on from this site to follow the paved road around and view some other buildings sites uncovered over the last 100 years.
Back to the information centre to check out the Petroglyphs up on the rock face behind the Centre.
The walk up to these ancient works of art was steep and through further ruins, but defiantly worth the climb to view these works up high done so long ago.
As we descended we noticed a fossil in a small rock of a spider, it was wonderful and complete as well as in a stone that would fit into your hand. VERY tempting to take it as a souvenir, but keeping faith with the surrounds and with respect a quick look and replaced for others to enjoy.
Time to head back home; reluctantly we moved the Castle out and suffered the 12 miles of horrendous buffeting for an hour, before we hit the paved road again.
We survived this trek and certainly to learn about the centre and development of this culture, that is linked with so many old ruins around this area, including the Mesa Verde, next in our sights, was worth the enjoyment to have the knowledge, but certainly do NOT recommend the drive in a Castle, it appears to be a little better in a well sprung car, they passed us travelling at around 35 mph.
Never mind tired and hungry, we arrived back and set up the Castle and relaxed and had dinner to settle in to watch a movie (gee Pretty Woman, someone Had to watch that!)
Moving into another state tomorrow, to bring the number of states visited to 40, not bad for simple travellers, in a short 6 months.
