9/23/18 National Public Lands Day

Saturday, September 23rd was National Public Lands Day, so visitors could come and see the park for free and we had some fun activities. This board has a question that was part of the day. Let me know if you have the answer!

Can you see the Great Blue Heron sitting on the rock in the middle of the stream? It was observing National Public Lands Day too! 

We set this picnic table up at the Contact Station. One the table are examples of Mimbres Art, yucca paint brushes, paint, and bowls to paint on.

These bowls were painted by visitors. The circle in the top righthand part of the photo is an example of Mimbres Art.

More examples of Mimbres Art. The Mimbres people created these designs on their pottery. We had paper bowls out so visitors could use a yucca paint brushes to paint a design on a paper bowl. (The paper bowl represented a clay pot.)

Another example of Mimbres Art.

And one last example of Mimbres Art.

These two rocks are a Mano and a Matate. The Mano is the smaller rock. The Matate is the larger rock.  The Mano is about 6 inches long and 4 inches wide. the Matate is about 10 inches long and 8 inches wide. These tools were used by Native American People to grind corn.
First you put about 10 corn kernels on the Matate. Next you use the Mano to squash the kernels so they break open. Then you use the Mano to grind the corn pieces into a kind of flour. The flour contains pieces of rock, so when the Native Peoples ate it it ground down their teeth! It also takes a lot of corn kernels to make enough flour to make bread because as you can see in the photo, lots of the flour goes into the pores of the rock!

9/16/18 The Contact Station

I start my "work" day at the Visitor Center where we have a 10 - 15 minute meeting. Then I drive this park service car about 3 miles to the "Contact Station."

I carry a radio like this one so I can contact the Visitor Center and the Cliff Dwellings Volunteer since there is NO phone service within miles of the park.

About half of my "work" day is at the "Contact Station." The "Contact Station" is where people come to walk the trail to the Cliff Dwellings. The Cliff Dwellings are near the top to the cliff you see behind the building. Inside the building there are several exhibits.

One of the exhibits in the Contact Station building is this stuffed Mexican Wolf. The Mexican Wolf has been reintroduced in the Gila wilderness. The wolf pack lives north of the Cliff Dwellings where they are safe from people.

Another exhibit is these Macaw feathers. They were found inside the dwellings which means that the people who lived here 800 years ago traded with people from Mexico, and/or Central America where Macaws live.

All of these pieces of pottery were found in the Cliff Dwellings, or in this area. You can see that they are decorated in different colors and patterns. They are at least 800 years old!

I couldn't get a very good photo of this exhibit, but each square contains a kind of food the people who lived in the Cliff Dwellings ate. The next photo tells what is in each square.

The small rock would have been held by a girl, or woman. She would put kernels of corn on the large rock then used the small rock to grind the kernels into flour.

This is the "Fee station." There is no booth on the road where people pay if they want to enter the park. Instead there is this "fee station" near the Contact Station. Adults over 16 pay $10.00 to walk to the Cliff Dwellings.

I stand outside near this map of the trail to the Cliff Dwellings and describe the trail, tell visitors that they can only take water on the trail, and explain to them that dogs are not permitted on the trail. I also tell them that the trail is a loop that is about a mile long, but it seems much longer since much of the way is up the side of the cliff!

9/22/18 The Trail to the Cliff Dwellings

Half of my day, I spend at the Contact Station.
The other half I spend in the Cliff Dwellings which means I have to hike up to almost the top of the cliff you see beyond this bridge. In this post, I wanted to give you a feel for the hike to the Cliff Dwellings.

After walking across that first long bridge over the West Fork of the Gila River I have to walk across many shorter bridges because the trail winds through Cliff Dweller Canyon and the Cliff Dweller Canyon stream runs down the canyon. What is interesting about this first bridge is that it runs over a dry wash. 

There are a few steps up before arriving at the next bridge which does have water running under it. Cliff Dweller stream begins at a spring which is about a mile further down the canyon than the trail.

As we travel farther down the trail, we continue to go up. Can you see the stream running below this bridge? 

Another bridge across the stream. See how beautiful  and green Cliff Dweller Canyon is?

At this bridge you can hear the water in the stream rushing down the banks. I haven't seen much of New Mexico, but many people who live in New Mexico tell me that hearing a flowing stream is unusual here, so they love to walk along the trail in this canyon.

See those log steps farther down the trail? That is the point at which the trail starts to be serious about climbing up to the Cliff Dwellings!

This squirrel stopped to look at me as I passed. His expression seems to say, are you serious? Why not just stay here in the cool canyon?

Another bridge

And another bridge...

On that bridge I stop and look up...I still have a long way to go! 

And another bridge

And another bridge

This part of the trail is one of my favorite parts because it reminds me of the trails at Starved Rock State Park in Illinois where I have been many times!

But I have NEVER seen a sign like this at Starved Rock! The sign means watch out for rattlesnakes! Perhaps the snakes can read because often when visitors report a rattlesnake on the trail, this is where it is! I feel kind of disappointed because I haven't seen a snake yet!

Then stone steps up to another bridge!

See the rock waterfall below the bridge? 

Now we're starting to get serious about going uphill!
These are what are called "trail stairs" because they're made of rock and very uneven!

More steps, but the sign says "Photo View," so let's see what that means!

It means that you can look across the canyon and see the Cliff Dwellings from a distance.

But we're not quite there yet, so let's start hiking up these trail stairs.

We are finally there! That's the path the winds around the outside of the Cliff Dwellings. Now I can take aa short rest before beginning the next part of my "work" day which involves answering questions and interpreting the dwellings for visitors. That will be my next post!

9/13/18 Spirit Canyon PIctographs

Yesterday I was off so I headed to Spirit Canyon because some visitors to the Cliff Dwellings showed me photographs they had taken there and I wanted to see the pictographs myself. It took about an hour to drive there. I wasn't exactly sure where it was so I stopped at the Spirit Canyon General Store to ask for directions. The woman at the store told me that the pictographs were about an hours hike up this wash. (A 'wash' is a dry river bed.)

These were the first pictographs I saw. (The pictographs are the reddish-brown drawings on the cliff face.)

Then I saw these dots. I don't know if they were supposed to be pictographs, or the artist was just trying out the paint he made!

Now this is a really cool pictograph! What it is supposed to represent, I don't know, but the artist sure spent a lot of time drawing it!

What do you think these pictographs represent?

What about these? What do you think they represent? Your guess is as good as mine!

What about this?

Or this?

Or these? 

Look carefully. Can you see the Canyon Treefrog hiding in the crevice of the rock?

See it now? (Look for it's black eye . Once you see that, look for it's body and legs.) Doesn't it have great camouflage?

Look at this weird rock! What caused those bubble-like formations?

I saw this little lizard when I was sitting down in the wash taking a break. His camouflage is not as good as the Canyon Treefrog's!