We hiked a 5 mile ranger lead tour into this canyon, Long Canyon on the Navajo Reservation. Yellow flowers, cliff fendlerbush blooms and bush.
View of the canyon on the way down. We walked down 1,000 feet of elevation on stairs the CCC built.
Looking up at the canyon walls from below. Cassandra our forest service guide is a Navajo whose family has been in this area for generations. She told us about the Navajo uses for many of the plants and lots of history of the area. She is showing us a metate here.
In the bottom of the canyon near the cliff dwelling it was very lush. These are oak trees with a flower under growth. Sheep petroglyphs, a lizard petroglyph, a metate for grinding corn and a white flowering bush.
Sweet peas were growing under the oaks. There were aspen trees there as well. Our destination was Betatakin cliff dwellings in this large alcove. The name means ledge house in Navajo. There were originally 140 rooms here, but erosion and rockfall has taken out many of them and there are only about 90 left.
Fir trees in the canyon. there were many long trees used in the construction of the pueblo. A closer view of the Betatakin.
Much closer views. We were not allowed to go up into the cliff dwellings.
Banana yucca in bloom, yellow sunflowers and spiderworts. The top two are pictographs at the dwelling. They were put there by the anasazi, but they are current day clan symbols of the Hopi clans. Cliff rose. It is sooooo fragrant.
Firecracker penstemon, evening primrose and asters. John climbing back up the 1,000 feet in elevation on the way back. It was brutal.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.