While in the Santa Fe area visited another ancient Pueblo dwelling area, this one encompassing both cliff dwellings and a pueblo walled area similar to Chaco Canyon. The cliffs are composed of “tuff” which is heavily compressed volcanic ash from the Valles caldera, a supervolcano that erupted over 1 million years ago in the area.

The canyon is very pleasant with a stream that runs year-round and lots of trees. This of course means lots of wildlife and the ability to plant and harvest fields in the canyon. The pueblo dwelling containing over a hundred rooms and several large kivas is on a level area above the stream flood area and near to the cliff caves that were enlarged by the ancient Puebloans to make dwellings. The cliff dwellings had some walled rooms built in front of them creating quite a large living and storage area.

We did one of the hikes that took us through the pueblo and up to some of the cliff dwellings. There are many more areas showing where the ancient people lived…but we were at over 7,000 ft and we felt one hike was enough!

We learned an interesting fact while here – we had thought this was an Anasazi site but we were told Anasazi translates to “ancient enemy” in the Navajo language and was incorrect to describe the people who lived here and elsewhere in the Southwest as they were never enemies but instead share common ancesters  So, that term is no longer used and instead the term ancient puebloans is used to described the people and sites in this region.

Here are pictures we took: