After a free overnight stay in the San Jaun Forest, we arrived at Target Tree Campground, only a short drive from Mesa Verde National Park. Located at 7,200 ft with lots of trees it provided comfortable temperatures day and night.
We enjoyed talking to our camphost Doug. He did say there are sadly a number of campers who are dishonest, staying the night but not paying. One woman in a van lied about putting an envelope in the slot and sped past us and Doug while he was checking.
Mesa Verde is a large park and somewhat imposing from the road. Once you are up on the mesa you can see areas of green justifying it’s name as a green (verde) mesa.
You can also see areas where fires took most of the green.
Our first day we biked the old tram path on Wetherill Mesa. We got some close up views of both early pit houses and clif dwellings.
Cycling at over 8000 ft did leave us gasping at the tops of hills. During one of our rest breaks we talked with. Ken and Alice who had some advice on our possible travel to Alaska.
We also met Christina and Bernard from Switzerland who encouraged us to expand our travels to Europe.
Our second day on Chapin Mesa, we hiked the Petroglyph Point Trail. The ranger said is was somewhat strenous and 2.5 miles. We would rate it as very strenous and it seem more like 4 miles. But we did get a selfie at the Petroglyphs.
During the course of our visit we learned that the Ancient Pueblo Indians, often called Anasazi, inhabited the mesa from about 550 AD till the late 1200s. They advanced from small pit houses to large, multi story cliff cities.
It seems extended drought in the late 1200s likely forced them to abandon their cities.
We wondered if the cost of keeping those cliff dwellings up, monotony of daily life or wanderlust contributed to their desire leave it all behind.
One of the best things about Mesa Verde Park was the free showers. This was something our campground did not have so we enjoyed taking long hot showers at the end of each day in the park.
We were however perplexed that they needed to have this sign in the shower.
