Playing on a Ladder

Mesa Verde :: Cliff Palace

It would probably seem to be a good bet that from Hovenweep I would go to visit the “cliff dwellers” at Mesa Verde National Park, located near Cortez, Colorado and about 50 miles east of Hovenweep. The park contains over 4,000 known archeological sites including cliff dwellings and the mesa top sites of pithouses, pueblos, masonry towers, and farming structures although many of them are not accessible to the everyday visitor.

The first stop was the campground. Even though I was assured by the Ranger at the entrance station that the campground never fills up, I wanted to make sure that I had a site for the night. After securing my site I drove the dozen or so miles winding up the mountain side to the visitors center. A ticket, for the nominal sum of three dollars, is required to tour the cliff dwellings. The number of visitors on each tour is limited as are the number of daily tours to each site. There were several slots available for the two dwelling sites that were open – Cliff Palace and Balcony House – and I obtained tickets for Cliff Palace that afternoon and Balcony House the next morning.

There are signs posted at the waiting area for the tours warning that “Visiting the cliff dwellings will involve strenuous hiking and climbing. If you have any health problems do not attempt.” Dire warnings, indeed. But the trail is only a quarter of a mile long. How difficult could it be?

A portion of the Cliff Palace seen from the top of the trail. A large part of the dwelling is off to the left and much of it is barely visible in the shadows.

Several of the towers are four stories high. Park literature states that “The cliff dwellings of Mesa Verde are some of the most notable and best preserved in the North American Continent. Sometime during the late 1190s, after primarily living on the mesa top for 600 years, many Ancestral Puebloans began living in pueblos they built beneath the overhanging cliffs. The structures ranged in size from one-room storage units to villages of more than 150 rooms. While still farming the mesa tops, they continued to reside in the alcoves, repairing, remodeling, and constructing new rooms for nearly a century. By the late 1270s, the population began migrating south into present-day New Mexico and Arizona. By 1300, the Ancestral Puebloan occupation of Mesa Verde ended.”

And, “Recent studies reveal that Cliff Palace contained 150 rooms and 23 kivas and had a population of approximately 100 people. Out of the nearly 600 cliff dwellings concentrated within the boundaries of the park, 75% contain only 1-5 rooms each, and many are single room storage units. If you visit Cliff Palace you will enter an exceptionally large dwelling which may have had special significance to the original occupants. It is thought that Cliff Palace was a social, administrative site with high ceremonial usage.”

It was fascinating. And the trail really wasn't so bad. A metal stairway leads to a series of uneven stone steps of varying heights. Then the path goes along the edge of the cliff making its way around to a 10-foot ladder going up to the next level. From there, you had to go back down a ways along a stone and dirt path finally reaching the area of the cliff dwellings.





The park Ranger preparing to climb the last of the ladders back to the top.

At first glimpse, and from a distance, the final ladder climb looks scary. This was taken from the trail waiting area before going on the tour. But, as you can see from the previous photo, the ladder hugs the wall and it was a relatively easy climb.

Chelveston - Yelden - Shelton - Chelveston

Led by Barry. With Gordon and me. About 8.25 miles. Garmin playing silly games at our snack stop! Warm, sunny, but some mud underfoot.



We set off from Chelvestonat about 10 am. There is a memorial to the USAF 305th Bombardment Group (heavy) who operated out of the airfield during World War II, with the loss of many personnel.

The memorial was erected in 2006

The upright is the pole from which the wind-sock flew on one of the hangars

Our route took us past the Star and Garter pub, then on to a footpath which divided into a footpath and bridleway soon after a gate. We took the left hand path - the bridleway, which was a bit clearer though still covered in tall grass at this time of year.

We followed this path uphill, through another gate, eventually arriving at the old runway - on our left was a mobile phone mast, on our right an agricultural building of some sort, with various trucks. The public footpaths through the airfield were reopened only in 2006, after local action.

A useful, if not beautiful, landmark

We turned right along the old runway/road, and when we were almost on a level with the mast we turned off to the left, and then right through a strip of woodland. We emerged at the other end of this and turned left along a quiet minor road, which took us into Yelden, via Church Lane.

Yelden church

Well, you would . . .

I realised that we'd been here before, on Feb 27 ,only when the motte and bailey came into view

"the finest archaeological monument in Bedfordshire"

We turned left past this site, then left again to join the Three Shires Waybridleway, which we followed as it wended its sometimes muddy way, as far as Shelton.



We stopped here to have a look around the small church, which dates from the twelfth century. Snack break too.

St Mary's Church in the well-kept village of Shelton

We took the footpath opposite the church, which took us more or less north west right back to the old airfield runway again. We turned left and walked for a good half-mile, past the agroindustrial unit to pick up the path we used at the start of the walk. We retraced our steps to Chelveston village.

Wordless Wednesday :: Yum

Fresh. Purchased at the field. Scrumptious.

With a penny, just so you can compare the size!

Sage and Sunflowers

Crater Explorations

Late July brought a climbing team to Mount Rainier that was looking to do something a little bit different. Their mission was to explore the summit crater and it's ice caves, with the Kautz Glacier as their route of access. By the looks of their pictures it looks like they succeeded, big is the only way to look at them.













No significant in-depth exploration or research of the crater caves has been done since Willian Lokey in 1971 and 1972.William Lokey will be presenting about "Project Crater" and his crater explorations at the Paradise Inn Saturday, August 17th starting at 9:00 PM! This event is free however Park Admission is still required.










From Xavier:

"The climb went great. We spent 24th on the summit which was probably the hardest part of the whole climb. You know... altitude."










"The caves are amazing. We didn't get much time in them as everybody was feeling a bit altitude sick + cold and tired but I got some good shots nonetheless. See below. I would love to spend more time up there and document the phenomenon more thoroughly."










"Ice caves in crater, wicked!"



The summit craters and steam vents have provided mystery and refuge to climbers since the early days of climbing Rainier. For more information check out Dee Molenaar's classic The Challenge of Rainier.



-682

Morning Stretch

Cassi doing her morning stretches. Notice her tail doing a weird twist.

Moose cow and calf on Teal Lake

(Click the image to view a larger version)

Today on my way to work I saw, for the first time, a Moose on the shoreline of Teal Lake. Not only that, but it was a cow Moose with a calf! To top it off, it was one of the Moose that have been collared by the Grand Portage Reservation Natural Resource Department! What a treat to see these animals today. The reservation has collared several Moose in order to track their movements over the course of two years and they will be using the collected data to help manage reservation lands for the benefit of Moose. I sat and watched this mother and child for about 10 minutes, and they barely moved. Just before I left the mother laid down in the grass and the calf followed suit. I wonder how long they stayed in this spot?

Smelling Spring

Trying to smell spring out the window and trying a bite of a flower, plus just being silly kitties.

Surrendering to the Pink

Last June I whined about too much Barbie pink in my garden and in my neighborhood, refusing to love the Pink Crepe Myrtle which grows in the area connecting our front sidewalk and drive to the garden gate.

This space was lawn when we bought the house - we Divas of the Dirt started the changeover to garden in March .., by transplanting three spiraeas into a group near the front sidewalk. After my friends left, I used the spiraeas as the frame for a Bat-shaped bed, planting passalong iris, coneflowers, balloon flowers and a pink bat-faced Cuphea among them. The scorned pink crepe myrtle stands at left in the above March .. photo. The white trunk in the background is a Yaupon holly.This spring I chose to embrace La Vie En Rose. Instead of fleeing rosy tones, I'd wallow in Blush & Bashful, Hot Pink & Magenta, and create a Pink Entrance Garden as an extension of the Bat-bed. Using a weed whip, I scribed a deep groove into the lawn, enclosing the pink crepe myrtle as an anchor at the outer edge. Once the shape looked right, Philo and I removed the turf, dug up the whole bed and added compost and decomposed granite. Hardscape can be expensive and tree removal ate most of this year's garden budget. I'd like to install brick or stone edging some day, but these rocks also qualify as hard, and they were free for the hauling. [Don't give up .... the photos won't all be beige and brown.]We chose medium to large rocks with pink or rosy tones and picked up flat ones for stepping stones. Evergreens added green bones to the design - a Spring Bouquet Viburnum and a Texas Mountain Laurel from the Natural Gardener . The souvenir Weigela from Howard's Nursery should do well here. Then I went shopping in my own garden - digging up pink plants that warred with adjacent flowers, taking divisions of crowded plants and rescuing pink plants that needed more sun.
I wanted everything to bloom in shades of pink, lavender, blue, purple and white, but with lots of contrast in foliage shape and size. I planted passalong White Iris, Pink Skullcaps/ Scutellaria suffrutescens and a small Hesperaloe, also called Red Yucca. I transplanted extra seedlings of Larkspur, Verbena bonariensis and Malva zebrina, teased a small piece of Grandma’s Phlox off the main plant, unpotted pink Chrysanthemums, sneaked out an Amarcrinum bulb from a container, added Liatris/Gayfeather from the plant-rescue table, moved Sedum that was too crowded, and transplanted Platycodon/Blue Balloon flowers & Echinacea purpurea/ Pink Coneflowers from the Bat-bed. Soon the 'Pinocchio’ Daylily had sunlight again; the 'Champagne' Mini-rose found a home; native white Cooper's Rainlilies were released from a container. Most of what I chose was fairly tough stuff, some of it was native and much of it would be drought-resistant if I could get it established.
While the new bed was being developed, the bridal wreath spiraea in the Bat-Bed distracted the eye and kept the focus on its froth of white flowers in April.
As the spiraea faded, Ellen’s purple iris burst into glorious bloom. Today the liriope edging is filling out while flowers in the Bat-bed include ‘Coral Nymph’ Salvia, pink rainlilies, purple coneflower and the large pink bat-faced cuphea.
Once the too-close coneflowers and Balloon Flowers were moved to the pink bed, the Cuphea had room to grow tall and full.
I opened my wallet and paid for a few plants. Our local grocery store wanted $5 for a one-gallon pot holding three plants of dwarf Pink Gaura. I bought a Rugosa Rose called ‘Therese Bugnet’ described as tough, pink and fragrant. I found Pink Pansies for the hanging basket in late spring, [replaced with Evolvolus 'Blue Daze' for summer] and planted a strain of Heirloom Petunias in pink, white, magenta and lavender.
Garden blogger-turned Mommy-blogger Martha passed along some unnamed Crinum bulbs, which were tucked in on either side of the Crepe myrtle. Pam/Digging passed along a young Mexican Oregano which went in front of the tree. Liriope divisions from another bed are tiny now, but will someday define the back edge. I planted seeds of Amaranth and Cosmos. We added more hardscape with a repainted old bench from the back yard, placing it between the new bed and the garden gate to act as bait for strolling chlorophyll lovers.
So how did My Life in Pink work out? We rushed to make the new bed before the heat & drought arrived. A rainier-than-normal spring meant that the native plants like Liatris, Coneflowers and white trailing lantana looked wonderful in May and June and the Cooper's lilies bloomed.
The rains helped settle in the larkspur, balloonflowers, skullcap, 'Champagne' mini-rose, heirloom petunias and malva. I was sure that if the plants looked this good in June, they'd look even better by the time the pink crepe myrtle bloomed.
It's now late in July, the heat hasn’t arrived yet, and Austin is in the middle of the rainiest year ever recorded - we've had another 3 and 1/2 inches just since Monday. Many plants look kind of beat-up and overgrown - like this 'dwarf' 3-foot tall gaura. The Texas Mountain Laurel is not happy to be living here. The Scuttelaria is looking cranky. The bed is looking very shaggy! I'd hoped that keeping the grass edged around the bed would give it definition, but the electric edger can't be used when every day is rain day.
The phlox is alive, but neither the new division nor the original plant bloomed this year. The cosmos has had a couple of flowers, the amaranth never sprouted. I'm still hoping that the pink garden can bring other gardeners to my garden gate. But we can sit on the bench and bask in the watermelon pink glow of the crepe myrtle that started it all. We can also look at that ‘Therese Bugnet’ rose, appointed as the Queen of Pink...she's a beauty, but her name is not Therese.