Does this look like us? It is not!! See other people are more creative with traveling space. This is stacked up man high on the top of the van!!
June 17, 2009 Wednesday Went to Visitors’ Center when they first opened to book 3 tours of the ruins– the only way to see them now. We go on the first – Balcony House. A smaller site probably with 2 family clans living here. Myia has client hour from Amsterdam - no phone reception but with internet we were able to Skype and see and visit with the person half a world away. Modern life is truly amazing. Driving a while on the top of this Mesa top, curvy and up and down, taking quite some time. Then The Long House. Then a museum visit.
Then another tour to the “best of the ruins” Cliff Palace. At the Cliff Palace tour with the ranger we meet a fascinating family from Rhode Island traveling the West in a rented RV. Six adults, 3 brothers and three sisters traveling together! And they are Native Americans from the East Coast! I was asking myself as I told Gerrit what I know about Native American History, what happened to the East Coast Indians. Now I know. Some are living in Rhode Island and other places I am told. Very interesting getting to know and share with these people their experience of living in the US East coast and of visiting Native Sites in the West. They are going to Chaco tomorrow and we hope to meet up again!Then we go back to the campsite for a quick cooked dinner in the van and then to bed – a long, blessed day! 
June 18, 2009 Thursday Up early again to plan the next adventure. On the way past the Park Myia sees a curious rock on top of another by the roadside. No, it’s not a rock, it’s an animal, a dark headed and dark tail Beaver!! Never seen one before. Very exciting.We have decided to go toward Santa Fe and Taos. And we decide to take a detour to “America’s Most Beautiful Road” – the million dollar highway – from Durango to Silverton in the Colorado Rocky Mountains. We go into steep mountains and over passes thru the most spectacular picture perfect mountain scenery. They call this America’s Switzerland. We go thru the cute silver and gold towns of Silverton and Ouray.
Fellow travelers have told us about a clothing optional natural hot springs, quite a few in this area. We stew in the lovely warm/hot waters for a while with the Rocky Mountain Peak view relaxing you. This is a welcome treat since Myia has apparently pulled a muscle or pulled something else out going thru one of the ruins small doorways! We get nearby Chaco Canyon Cultural Historical Park this night and sleep peacefully off the highway 550.
June 19, 2009 Friday We wake up to find ourselves in the middle of nothing. Yes, I mean nothing! Well, being culturally sensitive as we are we would say that it is a vast flat field of sage brush and deserty plants for miles and miles around. It is amazing as we have been in mountains and valleys so much. This is in New Mexico and reminds me of when I visited here the vast flat “nothingness” of parts. We travel down 16 miles of dirt road (Whew!) and move onto Chaco which we find out was a center of the Ancestral Puebloan Peoples from 800 – 1200 AD. They had a high degree of organization and built “Great Houses” in a special form with a “D” configuration. They were excellent astronomers and charted the path of the sun and celebrated solstices and equinoxes much as Stonehenge did. They are having big festivities tomorrow, June 20 and 21st for the solstice. We decide to stay for the sunrise and watch the sun knife blade between 2 rocks and land on the petroglyph or alternately shine thru a doorway and into a special wall niche in one of the Great Houses.
We watch an amazing sunset in this amazing canyon full of ancestral energy. We head out of the park, since the campsite is closed.Then while traveling out on the dirt road, doing our best to miss the many cows and washboards on the road, we almost run into a pair of porcupines who seem to be doing it right “on the road”! We have seen so much wildlife so far on this trip. We add these to the list.We stay at a place of the dirt road, close to the park entrance. And sleep nearby quietly till 5am! June 20, 2009 Saturday We get up early for Solstice Rituals.
The neighbor Akima Indians, who also claim the Chacoan area as the place where they origin from, come to dance the sun up and celebrate the longest day. The only thing is the guest of honor is not visible. The sun is clouded! The dancers are great and there is a large lovely crowd of fellow sun worshipers though. We decide to take the mountain road past Cuba (Gerrit always wanted to go there!) toward the Jemez Mountains, Pueblo and land toward Los Alamos, where the Manhattan Project secretly planned the Atomic Bomb in WWII. Picking up a local paper as Myia likes to do, she gets very excited to find out that the famous “Rainbow Gathering” will be held nearby. The paper is “warning” local residents to expect the crowds, forestalling fear and dread. We wanna go!! We’ll see how our plans can work. Today the weather has continued cloudy and now rainy – unusual for this area and time of year, the story we have heard many times on this trip. We are so delighted not to have hot temperatures at this time of year. Thank you again for all your prayers for we are having the most blessed trip. We got to the Los Alamos Library to put things on our blog for you all and then head down into the valley before we head up to Taos. So many beautiful views all around. And then we start up the Rio Grande Gorge toward Taos. 
We stay overnight in a private place we find right on the river – a room with a view!
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