LasVegas to Sante Fe NM

After a few days in Vegas ( saw a couple of shows the best being Love, a Cirque Soleil to Beatles music), we flew home to see the kids and grandkids, relatives and friends. It was great to see how much the little ones had grown in just 7 weeks. Everyone is in school and doing well. Before we left Vegas, we toured the Hoover Dam. What an impressive piece of engineering. The tour into the dam was very informative. We drove over it with the RV as we left the area to head to the Grand Canyon. Last fall, we visited the North Rim so the South rim was a natural choice. ( the North Rim is closed this time of year for the winter). The Grand Canyon has spectacular scenery and wildlife. Our first view of the Canyon showed the end of the Bright Angel Trail that we took about 20 years ago with our children. We walked to the overlook of the river and back up in the same day. The kids have never forgotten how tough and fun it was. This time there was only an hour to jump down the trail and come back up. What beautiful sights from inside the canyon! Ledges, arches and petroglyphs were visible on the hike. A lecture by a NP ranger on the California condor was informative and exciting. We learned about the efforts to restore the population of the condor after only 22 remained in the world in the 80's. The program has been successful with about 60 living in the Grand Canyon now and 275 in California. We dreamt of seeing one but it was not to be. During the lecture, we were on the lookout for any to appear, Another reason to return to the GC. A family of Longhorn sheep were walking along the canyon walls that evening. Mom, Dad and baby walked and ran easily along the canyon walls often looking like they would go over the edge. We topped off the evening with a beautiful sunset which caused the canyon rocks to glow.
Our next stop was Canyon de Chelly NP in Arizona. On the way, we stopped along I40 to see the best preserved Meteor crater in the world. The vast floor of the crater has a circumference of 2.4 miles and is more than 550 feet deep. It is the NASA training site for the Apollo astronauts especially the Lunar Rover work because the site's surface is most similar to the moon. A guided hike to the edges and overhanging observation decks as well as a meteor rock that came from the collision 50,000 years ago. It astounded and amazed us!
We arrived later that day at the Canyon de Chelly in a remote section of eastern Arizona. We felt like we had driven to the end of the earth. The NP sits on an Navajo Indian reservation and the campground was within the NP and free to stay. The setting was beautiful with cottonwood tree leaves turning a blazing yellow. A full day jeep tour led by our Navajo guide, Arnelle, took us 40 miles out and back along the floor of the canyon. The open air jeep bounced and powered thru the sand at the bottom of the canyon to see the ruins. The red sandstone walls of the canyon jutted out and up at every angle. The Anasazi Indians had built their homes on the sides of the sandstone mountains and lived her from 800 AD to about 1300 A.D. The remains of their homes were visible today as well as pictographs and petroglyphs that were drawn at that time. The North route explored the Canyon del Muerto (Canyon of the dead) and we returned thru the South Canyon to see Canyon de Chelly. Our nine hour tour made us wonder how these people thrived. Currently about 25 Navajo families live in the canyon. Some of them offered their crafts for sale as well as their fry bread. Their horses and cows lined the dirt paths of the canyon.
On our way to Santa Fe, we stopped at the Acoma Pueblo to see the oldest continuously imhabited community in the US. Sitting on top of a mesa, the Acoma people live without the conveniences of running water or electricity or plumbing. Their pueblo consisted of many well kept homes, kivas, a church, and a cemetery. They referred to the burying of their dead as planting as they strongly believe in the afterlife. No pictures were allowed of the church or the cemetary and a permit was purchased to take pictures of the pueblo. Their society is a matriarchal one with the land being passed down through the mother to the youngest daughter. Many native artisans live in the pueblo who make unique and amazing pottery to sell to their visitors. After our tour, we walked down from the mesa on the stone stairs that the Acoma people used to go to the valley for water. We could not imagine navigating those crude stairs with a water jug perched on our head.
Arriving in Santa Fe, we visited the Cathedral, the Chapel with the miraculous wooden spiral staircase, the Georgia O'Keefe museum as well as the Capital building which housed over 600 pieces of art. What a spectacular display of New Mexican art in a beautiful round building. The square and many of its buildings were being renovated for the 400 year birthday of Santa Fe next year. We drove up to Taos on a beautiful road that hugs the Rio Grande river which is lined with cottonwood trees. In the early days, travelers would know that if you needed to find water, look for the cottonwood. Taos is a beautiful artist community that focuses on health and spiritual enlightenment. It was back in the 60's that young people from all over the country migrated to the Taos area to live in communes and harvest their own food. Most of them are gone or turned into B&Bs now. The Santa Fe area especially Taos deserves another visit in the future.