AZTEC RUINS SITE NORTHERN NEW MEXICO

We had looked at visiting Chaco Canyon where a great house is situated but the 20 miles of badly washboarded dirt road we had to drive put us off. So we headed on across the top of New Mexico on our way to Taos. On our way we saw a small National Monument called Aztec Ruins and went in as we passed by.


Much to our surprise we found ourselves looking at a well preserved great house with one of the largest kivas in the USA.




The building techniques used surprised us with their sophistication.
For instance look at the ends of the roof beams, cut with a stone axe then squared off with a sandstone block. But others just seemed to have no real use other than aesthetics. The green layer of blocks comes from a different area than the sandstone used for the rest of the blocks. But both were carried for miles from the quarries used.

The plan showed below is only a small part of the complex but is the part open for visits. All show carefull planning and the construction was an ongoing process with timber beams being imported and stored for decades before being used.

The work was carried out over a couple of centuries with different styles of stonework used. The experts think that the early work was based around the Chaco canyon style but the later is from Mesa Verde and the cliff dwellings.

We were able to walk through some of the internal rooms.


Boy o Boy were the doors small, I would have had to crawl through the next one.





The great kiva is a reconstruction but they think it is pretty accurate except for the height of the roof.

It is the most impressive piece of pueblo architecture that we have seen. The internal pillars are set on great circles of limestone which were quarried many miles away and moved here somehow. They weigh several hundred pounds each.



Also puzzling is the purpose of the two rectangular vaults in the ground. One theory is that they were foot drums, another is that they were used to germinate corn.

Like all the other pueblo buildings they were abandoned in the late 13th century. Some experts think that a succession of drought years forced them south to the Rio Grande area of Texas, others talk of invaders from the North forcing them out, personally I think they heard that Walmart had a sale on in Texas and they all left to get in line for the midnight opening.

We moved to a state park after Aztec. The Navajo Dam park is a mini Lake Powell with beautiful lakeside campgrounds and at this time of the year we had no problem finding a prime site overlooking the lake.

But as you can see from the snow on the pole it was chilly there when the sun was not shining.







Our next stop is Taos where we might see some serious snow if the weather forecast is accurate.