Woke up this morning in Cortez, Colorado, just 45 minutes west
of Durango (in case that helps anyone). Started the day
with a leisurely Comfort Inn breakfast on their outdoor
mountain-view deck, along with more French tourists. We
feel bad that the poor European tourists eat chain hotel
continental breakfasts and drink the terrible coffee, after they
(Europeans) provided such tasty breakfasts for us all last
summer. "Mmmm", they must say, "I think I'll have just one
more slice of that delicious perfectly square piece of white
sandwich bread, and maybe a banana that won't be ripe for 3 more
weeks!". We kept to our word
and drove right by Mesa Verde, but were so intrigued by the
Aztec Ruins National Monument in Northwest New Mexico that we
simply couldn't help ourselves and had to stop. Contrary
to the name, as you might guess, these are not actually Aztec
ruins, but were mistaken as such by the first Spanish explorers
to come across them. They went ahead and named the town
there Aztec, which apparently stuck. In any case, these
were really cool ruins to see. The round ceremonial Great
Kiva is the only of its kind that's been fully restored. So
while it may lack a teeny bit of authenticity, it's still
interesting to see how it actually looked during its 500 years
of use.
After leaving the ruins, we
officially resigned ourselves to the fact that our trip was
over, and we headed straight home. Our house seems nicer
than we remembered - anything would after some of the recent
motels we've seen. Everything was in order, except for our
dead grass. The sprinkler system went out during a power
outage a couple of weeks earlier, and there hasn't been a drop
of rain since. We have to say thanks to our generous
neighbors Charles and Sandy for looking after the place, cutting
the (formerly living) lawn, taking out the trash, and generally
just being great neighbors.
Now, time to fill the
refrigerator and cabinets again, unpack, and sleeeeeep.... time
to sleeep.
Caroline is a bit taller than the original inhabitants
Aztec Ruins National Monument
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The ceremonial Great Kiva at Aztec Ruins
Interior of the ceremonial Great Kiva at Atec Ruins
The ceremonial Great Kiva at Atec Ruins
Interior of the ceremonial Great Kiva at Atec Ruins |