Stephen's Story
Day 12
Today we woke up pretty early so that we could be ready to go with full stomachs to the national park. We got some maps and found all the places with the best things to see. I have pictures from everything we saw and most of the things we saw were built in like 1000 A.D. The Indian tribes displayed at the park built their houses out of mud and wood inside the canyon sides (those pictures will be in a gallery on the website). They also had 3 different generations or versions of their mud houses that the people made in the ground. The first version was a very simple design and they were only 1 room and not dug very deep. The 2nd version had 2 rooms and was slightly deeper. The 3rd and last generation of mud houses was dug way bigger than the rest and there were multiple rooms with better ventilations and better support for the roof. Then we ate lunch at the park and nobody was impressed. The gift shop was bad and so we just got restless and left headed back to the RV park. We were going to go to Phil's World again but we decided not to and instead mom took a nap. I watched the F1 race that I missed on Sunday, and I am not too sure what dad and Kyle did. We thought it would be a good idea to go get a nice dinner for the family because we were headed home the next day. As we pulled up to the restaurant in the truck mom discovered that it wasn’t open so we had to find another restaurant on the fly and it turned out to be really nice and enjoyable. I got a French dip and so did dad. Mom got a steak and Kyle got a hamburger with bacon of course. Then we went back home to start packing everything up in the RV so that Kyle and I didn’t have to get up in the morning early to do so because mom and dad planned on leaving early in the morning. Then we took showers and told mom which hats she should keep and get rid of. We ended the night watching Wedding Crashers. It is nice to have the TV in the RV working after all this time. We just have to remember to pack more DVD’s for more options.
Amber's Story
July 7, 2021 - Wednesday
Today we spent the entire day at Mesa Verde National Park. We were told by another family at the RV park last night that we should get there early because the crowds are heavy in the afternoon and it is blazing hot since there are few trees in the park. The national park is only a mile or so from the RV park so we got there shortly after 8:00am.
We started our adventure by hiking down to the Step House. It was interesting seeing how the Pueblo tribes lived around AD 1200. The boys and I then hiked the 1.5 miles to the Long House overlook. Unfortunately, I tried to get us tour tickets to see it up close but I was unsuccessful. Seeing it from afar was still nice. Stephen took lots of photos with his telephoto lens so we could see it close up. Kyle and I looked at the Badger house and saw how the ancestral Puebloan farming villages looked. Some of the pit houses were dug as early as AD 550. We continued through the park and looked at a lot of the pit houses and Pueblos, Spruce Tree House, Fire Temple, Sun Temple and ended our visit with a look from afar at the Cliff Palace.
We grabbed lunch at the park then headed back home. Kyle and I went to the pool. He swam and then joined me in the jacuzzi. We talked for awhile with a family from Washington DC who has had a challenging road trip thus far. We gave them pointers for their visit to Mesa Verde and Zion the following day. We went back to the RV and cleaned up for dinner. Mike picked out a highly reviewed restaurant for us and we set out toward downtown. The restaurant was closed so we made our way to Main St. Brewery and Restaurant. The food was good but the sangrias were great.
We got back home, cleaned up the trailer, packed up the motorhome and prepared for our long drive home tomorrow. The plan is to leave as soon as we wake up and stop in Flagstaff for a late breakfast then head home. It will be a long boring day tomorrow.
Favorite thing in Cortez: Kyle and Mike - Phil's World, Stephen and I - Mesa Verde cliff dwellings.
Favorite things about our entire trip: Kyle - UTV rides and Purgatory mountain biking, Stephen - the scenery in Silverton, Mike and Amber - Silverton area UTV rides (they were so beautiful).