Mesa Verde, Colorado - You Have to “Fit” to Visit
Where joining a tour depends on the size of your butt
Joining a tour does not usually depend on the size of your butt. At the Mesa Verde visitor centre in Colorado, however, a wooden frame labeled “virtual tunnel” tests whether your butt would be able to fit through the exit at Balcony House, an eight hundred year-old stone cliff dwelling. Of the various ruins in the park, this is the most demanding. Boldly, I bought my ticket without testing.
My wife and I joined about twenty others gathered under a thatched shelter at the Balcony House parking lot at the edge of a canyon. At forty-one years old, I was probably near the middle in age and at thirty-eight inches, certainly near the top in middles. A ceramic model showed the dwellings located in the cliff face beneath us. To reach them, we would have to go down steps and then up a ladder. To return, we would have to crawl through the dreaded exit and clamber up more ladders. Our guide Jill, a sturdy woman with a curtain of graying hair hanging from her broad-brimmed hat to the shoulders of her earth-toned ranger uniform, highlighted the potential fear factors of the tour - the tall ladders, the steep cliffs, the narrow spaces. No one turned back.
On our way down the hundred feet of concrete steps, Jill identified the Pinyon Pine and Juniper predominant in the area. “And this is the Wal-mart plant,” she said, pointing to the pointy Yucca. “The Ancestral Pueblo used it for everything from food to sandals to ceremonial shampoo.”
These resourceful people used to be called “Anasazi”, but modern Hopi, who consider themselves descendants, disapproved of the term because it means “ancient enemy” in Navajo. The Ancestral Pueblo left the area about eight hundred years ago, perhaps because of prolonged drought.
At the bottom of the stairs, we came to a puddle of water in a hollowed out section of cliff. The porous sandstone above allows water to seep through until it reaches the impervious shale layer, where it spreads laterally to the surface. During winter, moisture trapped in the sandstone freezes and expands, flaking off pieces of rock. After thousands of years, caves form like the yawning mouths of a great stone beasts, providing both shelter and water for dwellings like Balcony House.
Nearby was the ladder leading to the dwellings, now two-storeys above us. The ladder was made from trunks and branches worn smooth by thousands of tourist hands and feet. “If you have trouble with heights,” said Jill, leading the way. “Don’t look up or down, just straight ahead.” With these words of wisdom, our troop scaled the ladder like ants headed for the pantry.
The top does not leave room for celebrating because you must immediately squeeze through a narrow passage. This leads to the so-called balcony, a space with a low stone wall lining the edge from which you can look down the canyon. This may have been a nursery or perhaps for ceremonial dances. Testing the theories could be tricky. Testing the wall would be foolish.
Ancestral Pueblans built the wall and the many small rooms with pieces of stone and clay mortar. With water in short supply, they may have used urine to make the clay - nothing like that “new home” smell.
Some rooms were for sleeping and some for storing the corn, squash and beans grown in fields above. Some rooms were stacked two or three levels high, up to the ceiling of the cave, and entered using ladders. The sleeping quarters seemed tiny but presumably these people had no room for claustrophobia. The walls around the lower openings were blackened from the oil off hundreds of hands asked not to touch.
We passed through another narrow opening to an area without a guard wall. In the floor was a kiva, which looked like a large hot tub, about 10 feet into the ground, lined with stones. Modern Hopi still use similar structures for sacred ceremonies.
The depression in the centre was a fire pit. A small opening at the base of the wall ingeniously connected to the upper level as an air vent. A low barrier near the opening deflected and circulated incoming air. The sipapu, a small hole in the ground near the fire pit, represented the opening through which the ancestors climbed up into this world.
Pillars made of stone spaced evenly around the perimeter would have supported logs to form a roof, level with the rest of the main floor. A hole left in the middle allowed for entry and exit by ladder. Climbing through the smoke rising from the fire pit may have been part of a purification ritual.
After passing remnants of rooms displaying stones for grinding dried corn, we came at last to the little exit.
I watched others crawl through first, sizing up the situation. The camera, notebook, water and snacks stuffed into my fanny pack made me feel like a camel trying to pass through the eye of a needle. I slung my gear around my neck and wormed my way through. You can stand up in the middle of the short passage, but you have to get down on your hands and knees again to get out.
The opening was originally the entrance to the complex. The design may have made it easier to defend, or imposed a submissive posture for entering a place of reverence. I was just happy to get through.
Ascending the final rungs of the last wooden ladder to the parking lot, I reflected on the resourceful, spiritual lives of the Ancestral Pueblans, and a little more self-conscious than usual about the size of my butt.
Author : Raymond Nakamura
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