We walked through the museum and learned a lot about the Navajo weaving's, pottery and history. I did not know that the Navajo had there own "Trail of Tears" call the "Long Walk". It seems that relocation was a standard of our government at those times. They were forced from their land and made to walk to the opposite corner of Arizona. Once a treaty was signed allowing them to return to their lands the government gave them no assistance so not only did they have to figure their own way back but they also had to fight their way through other Indian tribes lands.
The other neat thing at the museum was a display of Navajo weaving. Each family that had weavers within their clan had a section where each weaving member of the family contributed a panel for their family. The different styles and usage of colors were very unique to each family. I would recommend a stop at this museum for anyone traveling anywhere near there. It is a side trip well worth making.
From there it was off the Chinle AZ and the Canyon De Chelly. This is a National Monument so there is no fee for entry. This is an area of canyons the Navajo used for farming purposes. They would go down into the canyons in the spring and plant their crops and then when summer came and the temperatures got to hot they would come out on the plains until harvest time when they would go back down and pick their crops and store them for the winter. Ansel Adams did some photography work their so if you look up his work you can see some black and whites of the area. We had the pleasure of having two chance meetings with some local Navajos that actually grew up in the canyons and they were very nice about sharing their experiences with us. One of the people's mother had posed for Ansel Adams and he was kind enough to show us pictures of his mother as a much older woman at the same spot Ansel had taken her picture when she was in her 20's. We went up the northern side of the area and stopped a several view points. At one of them we met an older Navajo woman selling pottery. It was a good thing (or bad thing depending on your view) that we were on the bike. She had one piece that anywhere else would have cost $800 to $900 and we could have got it for $150.I spoke with her and she told about her family and her growing up in the canyon. Here are a few pics.
We continued up the north side of the canyons on Indian 12. This is a beautiful ride and there was very little traffic so it felt like we had the road to our selves. We had thought about taking Indian 13 but when we got to the turn off we noticed that the rain clouds were packing in over the pass that 13 went over and it was clear in the direction 12 went so we stayed with that. We continued on 12 up to Round Rock where we got on 191. Round Rock is an area that has 2 mesas. 1 large one and one smaller one. Note that the large one has a hole in it on the left side and spires on the right end.
The road actually ended up going quite close to the right end and it was neat because there was a ranch at the base of it (sorry no pics of that). Once we got on 191 traffic was even less. The view was spectacular as you could look out in any direction for at least 50 miles and it was rather humbling knowing that there was no one close by. While there may not have been people close by there were however animals close by. In fact they were so close by that they were on the road. We came around one corner and here was a flock of sheep in the middle of the road. After almost coming to a stop we slowly rolled through them. There was one in the left lane that stood there looking at us and then actually started walking right towards us. It could not have been more than 2 feet from us as we went by. Did I mention that sheep are not the smartest of critters?
From there is was in to US160. We passed the turn off to 4 corners but decided that we didn't want to pay just to say we had done it, besides we need an excuse to take another trip one day hehehe. Once we got on US160 the wind picked up and we were back to fighting the winds for the rest of the day. Fortunately the rains stayed away and the ride was dry. Coming into Colorado from the south was very different from any of the other directions I had ever come by before. The terrain starts in the high desert plains and very slowly climbs to mesa lands and than to canyon tops. Very pretty, very uninhabited and very humbling.
We made the camp ground at Mesa Verde National Park in time to set up camp. Fortunately they had beer at the camp store and I was able to sit at the camp site enjoying a cold one and watching the sunset.
Tomorrow we visit Mesa Verde.
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