This is part 4 of our RV vacation (Denver to Vegas). The following are parts 1-3:
Going back to our map, you can see that we had a pretty long drive through the Wolf Creek Pass to Mesa Verde National Park. I drove a lot of this leg. Yes, I handled the rig just fine until we stopped at the Continental Divide. I knew what goes up must come down so I was scared of the slope on the other side of the divide. Daniel took over from the Continental Divide until we arrived safely at our campground at Mesa Verde (Label C). I mistakenly thought this would be my absolute favorite park. I just love old things and the idea of seeing archeological sites from 400 AD I thought would be right up my alley. Well, I found this park to be more commercialized than most of the other parks we went to. This park is run by ARAMARK. Well, that right there is enough to turn me off. Aramark ran the food services at GA Tech and I wasted away to nothing eating that food. They also run the food services at my work. I cringe when coworkers want to meet there. I spend 7 dollars on food and just move food around on my plate. Anyway, I digress. This park has the largest cliff dwellings in North America. These cliff dwellings, settled by the Ancestral Puebloan people, are very impressive if you can look past the crowds.
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| Our Campsite |
The campsite was nothing spectacular - not as nice as some of the other places we visited. I believe it had electrical hook up though. We were also visited by wildlife -deer. That evening, Miles got sick - yes, vomit. He actually vomited almost nightly for the rest of the trip. We believe he had altitude sickness.
In the morning after getting cleaning up, we headed on down to the visitor's center to sign up for a tour. Most of the dwellings can only be visited with a tour guide. We thought we would do Cliff Palace. It was the most popular. Our guide advisor took one look at us and decided that the Kuemmerles LOVE adventure. We laugh in the face of Danger. We walk on the wild side. Whatever.. You get it. Actually, she asked could Miles climb 32 feet up a ladder on a side of a cliff. We asked him and we have no idea what he said back to us so we assumed that was a yes. The Balcony House - that was the tour for us.
We drove to our to our tour and our tour guide looked at us. "Can he (pointing to Miles) climb up a 32 foot ladder? You can not turn back." We tried to look confident as we said, "yes, no problem!" Other than Miles, Grant was one of the youngest kids on this tour. Needless to say, I was a little nervous about my boys.
Well, my boys did just fine. Below, is one of the 12 foot ladders Miles had to climb. I did not get a picture of the 32 footer.. I was too nervous at the time. We stayed away from the edges. We learned a lot about how the dwellings were constructed. Our Ranger was pretty darn awesome and he had us all engaged in his story telling.
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| Really only the kids fit through the tunnel! We all made it though. |
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| Showers, laundry, and football |
The temperatures in this park were very cool. I was happy with a short sleeve shirt and long pants. It did get really cold at night and we all used our fleece pullovers then. We spent two nights there and one full day.
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