Kirtland, New Mexico

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Well...even though we are right outside of Chaco Canyon we are not getting in AGAIN! This is the 4th time we've tried to make it to the canyon and just a few days before we arrived, there was a huge rain storm that washed out the north road. So it goes. Instead we visited another Aztec site just north of our campsite.  The Aztec Ruins National Monument is an area of preserved structures built by the Pueblo people between 850 and 1130 and then discovered again in 1878 by anthropologists. The photo below shows the entire site (not our photo)


We were able to walk around the site and into some of the buildings.  (the rest of the photos and videos are ours)



The large circular building in the center is called the Great Kiva.  A Kiva is a gathering place for spiritual ceremonies, religious rituals and political meetings. 





The smaller rooms around the outside were used for food storage, cooking, eating and sleeping.
We wandered around inside some of the rooms and it was amazing to imagine what life would have been like for the people living here.





In the afternoon we took a drive an hour south to a really cool area called Bisti/De-Na-Zin Wilderness, or Bisti Badlands.  Its a huge area of unmarked trails that you can hike around.  We used the AllTrails app to guide us as we explored and I only felt lost once. It was like walking on the moon.






Tomorrow we leave New Mexico and head north to Bluff Utah to meet up with our friends Dale and Karen.  Looking forward seeing them and spending time in the beautiful state of Utah.









Comments

  1. KimOctober 6, 2026 at 12:05 PM

    it is amazing that they let people walk around those ruins when they are so ancient

    ReplyDelete

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