Today we are leaving Moab with some rain threatening clouds above our heads and continue our way further South. After days of scorching heat the temps are quite pleasant this morning at about 80F only. After breakfast at our coffee place in Moab we take Hwy-191 to Monticello, UT to find Hwy-491 which brings us into Cortez, CO. Here we take Hwy-160 which will lead us into Mesa Verde Nat'l Park. We stop at the visitor center to get some educational material and then enter the park for the scenic drive.
Our first stop is the Wetherill Mesa, but the trail is halfway closed for repairs and we can't really get to the mesa itself. So we turn around and decide to go to the Cliff Palace, but we can only see it from the overlook as access to the housings itself is only by guided tour and reservation.
We swallow that, make a mental note and stop at the House of Many Windows and then at the Balcony House. Here you can take a trail to let you have a view of the house and the Soda Canyon. But there is not much time to hang around as a thunderstorm is moving in. I make it just in time to the car before the first drops fall and lightning is striking the canyon. We just make a quick stop at the Chapin Mesa and Archaeological Museum because of their WiFi connection, and make a reservation for tomorrow to visit the Cliff Palace again with a guided tour.
We visited the Cliff Palace again today and were lucky to switch our guided tour to an earlier hour so the temperatures in the canyon were quite manageable. The ranger, himself a Native American, gave us a great inside into the living and migrations of the Pueblo People and we learned a lot about the people who lived here about 800 years ago. Time well spent this morning.
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