Click to enlarge the elevation profile.
We watched the sun rise as we traveled
by bus from the park entrance up15 miles
of steep switchbacks to Far View.
We were on the employee shuttle with
hotel housekeeping workers
and a couple of tour guides and cashiers.
Our tour guide, Bill
(with walking stick),
was a terrific storyteller.
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We learned
a lot about the Ancient Puebloans' daily life, culture, and architecture,
and how their society at Mesa Verde evolved over 700 years, roughly A.D.
600-1300.
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Summit Lake
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Halfway to Dolores, we took a break
at Summit Lake, where we encountered a real oddity. On the dirt road leading
to the boat ramp, emanating from the bathroom building (in addition to a certain
odor) was trumpet music. Not a recording -- someone practicing!
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At the grocery store in Dolores we met
three cyclists from Finland on fully loaded bikes with top-notch panniers
and camping gear. They were two weeks into a seven-week journey from San Francisco
to New York. Sisu!
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The Galloping Goose
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On display at the Dolores depot is a
restored Galloping Goose,
#5 in a fleet of seven
gasoline-powered "railbuses"
that ran on the narrow gauge
Rio Grande Southern line from the 1930s to 1952. |
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We took a half-day bus tour of the park's
Mesa Top Loop Road, stopping to walk around pit houses and cliff
dwellings
of the Ancient Puebloan people (the new, politically correct term for
the Anasazi).
We saw deer,
wild turkeys,
rabbits,
and a
tarantula.
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Click to enlarge elevation profile.
We got a car ride down to our bikes from two women from Santa
Fe who were on our bus tour, and we backtracked by bike the 7 miles to Mancos.
(Alas, the Absolute Bakery & Cafe was closed.) It looked like an easy
20 miles to Dolores
on the Dominguez-Escalante Highway (Route 184), but a strong headwind
posed a challenge.
Looking back toward Mancos
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We stayed at Dolores Mountain Inn.
The inn's photo gallery
-- Dolores
and environs, yesteryear and today,
and more Galloping Goose pictures
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