Day 11

I first have to say "AHHHHHHH!" There's way too much fucking family togetherness going on around here. Okay, I feel better.

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We drove to Mesa Verde yesterday. It is really a lot greener than I expected. There really is a mesa and it is green - who knew? Most of the pictures that you see from this place are of stone and soil and remnants of life hundreds and hundreds of years ago left by the Ancestral Puebloans (that's what they want to be called. We know them as the Anasazi Indians), so I didn't really expect to see any form of vegetation, but I did. In 1996 there was a huge fire that caused a lot of damage to some of the ruins and the land. Today there are thousands of burnt trees still standing, charred like little toothpicks in a field of green brush. It was really quite beautiful and a little sad.

We visited Cliff Palace on our tour. There are 3 guided tours you can take each about 1-1.5 hours long. It was HOT and I was completely worn out after our hike. That last little bit of hiking up the narrow and steep steps did me in. But the views were incredible.

By the way, Postcards went out yesterday, so you should be getting them soon :-)