Chaco Canyon New Year's Eve

KevX02

Observer
A year ago my brother-in-law (Moody) and his wife went to Death Valley NP to celebrate the New Year, they invited my wife and I to go along. We decided to stay home to attend a masquerade ball that our friends were hosting. The masquerade is an annual event that we’ve been attending since high school. My wife after seeing the pictures from Death Valley immediately regretted our decision to stay home in the boring unadventurous rhythm that we have subjected ourselves to year after year. Almost as a resolution we decided to go on an adventure next New Year’s eve.

New Year’s Eve is a great time of year for my wife and I to travel we are both college students and we are out of school, ready to be away from work and ready to be away from family for a while after the Christmas holiday. We set out for Chaco Canyon NM, a place I had heard about since I was a kid but never put much thought into going there until this past spring when I went to Mesa Verde NP and Canyon de Chelly. I am anthropology major and archaeology especially interests me.

After a long Lunch in Moab UT, a pull-over and warning in Dove Creek CO, and I long wait in a Wal-Mart line in Farmington NM we were racing sunlight to get to Chaco Canyon to set up our tent and make some dinner. We lost the race and set up our tent in the dark. I never mind doing this. I love to go new places in the dark and wake up pleasantly surprised at my surroundings and Chaco didn’t disappoint. There were two small ruins and white table-lands for miles.

This was a great way to set the tone for the day. I was not at all prepared for what I was going to see. After visiting the visitor’s center and rubbing elbows with the other patrons (my wife, and two or three other people) we planned our day, we wanted to see the Pueblo Bonito of course and do a little hiking to some of the more remote locations. We learned very quickly that we were not going to be able to see everything we wanted. The mud from the melting snow slowed us down so much and made it almost miserable to do much hiking but we were able to visit Una Vida + petroglyphs, Hungo Pavi.
 

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KevX02

Observer
Part 2

After some tail-gate pepper steak flat bread sandwiches we had enough energy to visit Chetro Ketl + petroglyphs, Pueblo Bonito, Pueblo del Arroyo + hiking around that area. This is when we got tired and started to complain about too much mud, it was almost impassible. We then decided to get into the FZJ 80 and drive out to Kin Klizhin. This is an unexcavated ruin on the far west side of the park. Our day was overwhelming, but very worth the trip. This humble ruin was a great way to end the day. One of the park rangers named Renee advocated Kin Klizhin as a great ruin to visit. She said here and her husband had visited two weeks earlier. Renee warned us that we’d better have 4WD, the mud and snow would be sure to give us trouble. The mud and snow were no trouble at all for my 80 series. It was a nice drive out we saw 5 bull elk. As we arrived there was a box with a signature log. Renee was the last name on the log Dec 13 2008; we were the next to sign the log, “Kevin and Whitney, from Taylorsville UT Dec 31 2008, Happy New Year!”
As I wrote this I realized the nature of our trip, to celebrate the New Year. I also at the same time realized that Kin Klizhin didn’t really care about the new year, it has stood for hundreds of new years and it’ll stand for hundreds more.

This was a great trip and Chaco Canyon and the many unvisited ruins will be calling me back for new years to come.
 

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Moody

Needs to get out more
Great photos. Whitney and that camera of hers...

I loved Chaco. Beautiful place. There is a theory that the inhabitants of Chaco traveled from Mesa Verde to Chaco to Mexico with the seasons. (I forget the name of the ruins in Mexico)
Apparently there is a "road" that can be seen from the air, and they are all alomost directly N to S from each other.
 

kerry

Expedition Leader
Thanks for the thread. Would you say the conditions you experienced were typical of winter conditions? I set out to go to Chaco a few years ago on Spring break, but had to abort due to a snowstorm that made it inaccessible.
 

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