Bandelier and Home

Up the ladder

The next morning we visited Bandelier National Monument, another place I had been years before – but haven’t blogged about. Bandelier was my first cliff dwellings. I have been to many, many since then. But, these are still very impressive.

The 50-square-mile monument preserves ground and cliff dwellings of Ancestral Puebloans dating between 1150 and 1600 AD. Although it is known for cliff dwellings, the Monument is actually about 70 percent wilderness, rising from the Rio Grande to the peak of Cerro Grande on the rim of the Valles Caldera (more about that later).

Bandelier was named for Adolph Bandelier, a Swiss-American anthropologist who researched the cultures of the area and supported preservation of the sites. The park was designated in 1916 and the infrastructure was developed in the 1930s by the Civilian Conservation Corps. I didn’t take any pictures of the lovely Visitor Center. I should have.

Interestingly, during World War II the monument area was closed to the public and the lodge was used to house personnel working on the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos to develop an atom bomb.

Looks like a Scotty

The area is covered with Bandelier tuff volcanic ash from the Valles Caldera volcano eruption 1.14 million years ago. 

The lava varied in hardness; the Ancestral Pueblo People broke up the firmer materials for bricks and carved out dwellings from softer material. 

Human presence in the area has been dated to 10,000 years ago. Artifacts from the area indicate that the community was part of a regional trade network that included what is now Mexico. The people who lived there are know as Ancestral Pueblo Peoples. They were formerly called Anasazi, which is actually a Navajo word that means "ancient enemies." That's why the descendants didn't like that name!

A view from above

In the past, it was believed that these people mysteriously and suddenly disappeared. But, current information indicates gentle migration to close-by areas. 

At first, they planted but did not cultivate native plants, including corn, squash and beans. But, later they developed agricultural techniques that took better advantage of scarce moisture to feed a larger number of people. This included terracing, check dams, grid gardens and irrigation channels.

As they became more agricultural, they moved down from the cliffs to the valley floor. 

Then, they spread out closer to the nearby  Rio Grande River. Spanish colonial settlers arrived in the 18th century. Bandelier first visited the area in 1880.

The dwelling site, which is in Frijoles Canyon (Bean Canyon) is reached along a 1.2-mile mainly paved loop trail from the Visitor Center. 

Old walls

First, you walk through the village of Tyuonyi (QU-weh-nee), one of several large pueblos found in Bandelier.

One-to-two stories high, Tyuonyi had about 400 rooms and housed about 100 people. It was reached through a single ground-level opening.

Interestingly, some of the building techniques appear to be imported from far away, suggesting frequent interaction among far-reaching ancestral peoples of the southwest.

Among the rock structures built on the canyon floor, is this ceremonial kiva (one of three on the valley floor), which would have had a wooden roof ... 

An open kiva

The rooms on the cliff were built in “cavates” produced by voids in the volcanic tuff of the canyon wall and carved out further by humans using only stone tools...

Houses hugging the cliff; Photo: Caty Stevens

This cliff faces south, which would have made it much warmer in the winter and much cooler in the summer than had it been on a north wall -- natural climate control. 

The outer buildings are gone, but you can still see foundations and beam holes

The lower walls were usually plastered and painted and the ceilings were blackened by smoke. This wasn't just an accident caused by heating and cooking; it was actually a technique that hardened the crumbly volcanic tuff to prevent it from falling on the inhabitants.

Some of the structures were reconstructed in the 1920s. Recent research indicates that the reconstruction may have been done incorrectly.

Reconstructed buildings

These recreations put doors in the front of the rooms, but new evidence suggests that the people living there probably entered their dwellings via openings in the roof.

You can see some of the wall decorations that were protected by walls, but are now open to the elements. 

One particularly bright petroglyph is protected by glass

There were a few petroglyphs on the canyon walls.

CW: a stylized human-type figure, a Macaw, an alien-looking figure and a bird

You can look into some of the structures by climbing up ladders similar to the ones the Ancestral Puebloans used ...

Caty takes a peek

The population in Frijoles Canyon probably reached its highest point in the early 1400s, when about 500 people lived on both the cliff and the valley floor. The pueblo was abandoned by 1600. The inhabitants relocated to pueblos near the Rio Grande, such as Cochiti and San Ildefonso, which are still occupied. Life expectancy, by the way, was about 35!

The railings protect the dwellings

We did only the loop trail. It connects to the Frey Trail, which goes out of the canyon. The trail was named after the family that operated the first tourist lodge in the canyon. 

In the early days, there was no road. Visitors hiked or rode in on horses or mules.

We didn’t see a lot of wildlife, but on the cliff face by the dwellings, we saw Canyon Wrens ...

Look how long that bill is

A Giant Flag Moth Caterpillar -- one of the most colorful caterpillars I have seen ...

Maybe inspiration for early native designs? Look at that preserved wall decoration above

And a Mule Deer, which Caty frightened, causing it to jump out of the bushes, which, in turn, frightened us. ...

Hey!

We walked back to the Visitor Center along Frijoles Creek (Bean Creek)..

Just a small creek

... where we encountered a Spotted Towhee, a very pretty bird that was hiding in dark bushes ...

Look closely to see its red eyes

And a Fence Lizard …

Next to, but not on, the fence

It was a beautiful day and a very pleasant walk through the ruins. It’s always a good day when you can visit ancient cliff dwellings.

Stops on the Way Home

Of course the day was getting late, but, as is our style, we wanted to make a few more stops. We drove along the edge of the high country of Bandelier to another newly designated spot -- Valles Caldera National Preserve, a 13.7-mile-wide volcanic caldera in the Jemez Mountains. 

Looks like a housing development sign

Valles Caldera is one of the smaller volcanoes in the supervolcano class and is the younger of two calderas known at this location. It buried the older Toledo Caldera, which in turn may have collapsed over yet older calderas. The youngest eruption of Valles Caldera was about 50,000 to 60,000 years ago. 

Seismic investigations show that a low-velocity zone lies beneath the caldera, and an active geothermal system with hot springs and fumaroles exists today.

We drove down a two-mile gravel road to the Visitor Center. Most of the Preserve doesn’t open until May – it is at a high elevation – so there wasn’t much we could do.

Not prime season yet; Photo: Caty Stevens

We made a few last stops – very briefly at Rio Grande del Norte National Monument, which I covered in a 2016 post. But, after we arrived, we decided we really needed to get home so that Caty could make it to work the next morning.

Quick stop

It was a lovely trip with revisits of extraordinary sites I’ve seen before and a couple of new places. I have now officially visited every NPS-administered site in New Mexico and a lot of the BLM ones. It is a beautiful state. And, the Guadalupe Mountains part of Texas – by far the highest point in Texas – ain’t too bad either.

Trip date: April 6-10, 2017