9.14.09 Mesa Verde

Hit up Mesa Verde National Park. This is the place with lots of cave dwellings of Anasazi Indians 800 years ago. These are the indians that, for reasons unknown to all, left around 1200 and left all their beautiful pottery and artwork on the walls but no written work or record of what precipitated their departure. Its kind of funny because the tour guide had to preface most of her sentences with, "We believe...We think...We feel...Our theory is...This could be because..." and told us the theories were in a constant state of flux. This, I believe, added to the intrigue of the whole thing. We learned they basically farmed on top of the messa and then climbed down via hand and foot indentations into the rock down to their dwellings. Their dwellings were impressively built of sandstone blocks and mortar made from clay, sand and water. After that we hit up the local pub for some eats and the Patriots game where Chad had some Zuberfiz Root Beer, Tony had his usual Diet Coke/Pepsi and Mike got charged one dollar for an additional piece of garlic bread. Then on to McPhee campground on the edge of the McPhee Resevoir; a huge body of water plopped in the middle of some serious desert. On the way to the campground we witnessed some of the most impressive lighting we've ever seen. Imagine a huge flat area with a few scatted trees and houses spaced at great distances in front of a large moutainous backdrop continuously being lit with thick vertical piercing bolts of lighting to the north and south of us. So impressed we almost killed Bambi as she chomped on some tall grass while standing on the white line of the highway.