Launching back into the #roadtrip photos... Here’s the first wave of shots from #chacocanyon . To say this place is “significant” is an understatement. For Ancestral Puebloan people this was the center of their world. The excavated ruins of the biggest building are shown from above in the first pic. Pueblo Bonito used to be smaller and was iterated on over multiple centuries, eventually by the 1200’s it had 800 rooms and stood 5 stories tall, was built according to a master plan, was divided into two halves, had multiple great kivas, and was a massive center for trade, religion, etc. It is thought that only 50-100 ppl lived here year round, but the trash piles suggest thousands of people would journey here on some regular basis for ceremonies, etc. The other pics show parts of Chaco canyon architecture from our hike to the Mesa tops. If you visit Chaco you gotta hike up to the tops and look down and around to truly appreciate the location and the scale of the structures. #tripoftheancients #ancestralpuebloan #stonemasonry
The Aztec ruins nat’l monument was phenomenal. We explored the museum and gift shop, watched the educational video, and took the self guided tour of the ruins. We walked through dark rooms, as some roofs were still intact, and crouched through stone doorways whose alignment was still super straight. In the 30’s the site’s great kiva was reconstructed to what they think it originally looked like, down to the paint and everything. Being in the massive kiva offered a glimpse 800 years into the past. They even play music in there. And all of this for no entry fee and $2 for the extra pamphlet. 🆒 #tripoftheancients #aztecruins #masonry #ancestralpuebloan #greathouse #thisplacerocks
