June 26th
We arose early, left our hotel in Cortez, Colorado and headed up to Mesa Verde. We took the 12:30 tour for the Cliff Palace which is the largest of the Mesa dwellings. The tour required moving through narrow passageways, some of the original narrow descending stone steps and additional metal steps constructed by the parks services to facilitate reaching the area once occupied by the Puebloans.
The tour was amazing and very interesting to see the methods used by these ancient cliff dwellers to keep warm during the cold winters, access a water source, farm the Mesa above to grow crops to feed the inhabitants and facilitate an area that protected them from attack or invasion from unfriendly outside sources. These people were quite small averaging 5’ to 5’2” in height. This was obvious since the rooms were tiny with small doorways and low ceilings. The construction of these dwellings must have been a difficult and amazing feat.
The round Kivas all constructed near the base of the dwellings were designed for both worship and heat where the inhabitants could go to get protection and warmth from the winter cold.
After our visit to Cliff Palace, we had to exit on ladders and narrow stairways constructed by the Puebloans. It was a long and arduous climb to the exit above, but certainly worth the price of the tour.
As we headed to the parking lot, we saw a sign on an unusual looking motorcycle with a sidecar that was obviously a unique sight. It was a customized1985 BMW, “K” bike with car tires instead of motorcycle tires. It had a specially modified Earl’s fork to accommodate the large tires and the body frame was extended. Not your usual showroom offer! On the rear saddlebag was a large logo for Bob’s BMW Motorcycles. Bob is world famous! Every BMW biker is familiar with Bob’s BMW Motorcycles.
Tinkering on this unusual piece of equipment was a short, bald headed white bearded, sturdy old gentleman wearing shorts and a tee shirt. John walked up to him and said, “hi, are you Bob?” “Yes I am”, replied the man. From that point on, the topic of discussion became his modified BMW "K" bike and BMW motorcycles in general. Before we left, I snapped a photo of John shaking hands with Bob! That’s just for all you BMW owners!
We have only one negative thing to say about Mesa Verde. When we arrived back at the bike, John found a lovely surprise. There, stuffed in the windshield was a nice $75 parking ticket! Personally, I think it was a cheap shot. There were no, “No Parking” signs posted, nor were there any diagonal lines across the space indicating this was not allowed. The area was too small for a car, but just right for a motorcycle and it was the only spot in the shade with temperatures exceeding 110 degrees. I snapped a picture of the bike so I could have it for evidence when needed.
Along the route, we stopped at areas just to take in the amazing view. At one point we noticed an elderly gentleman peddling a bicycle. I chatted with him momentarily and found out his name was Hans and he was from Germany. Hans was en route from New York to SanFrancisco when we met him riding up and down mountains in Colorado! This man was in amazing shape and from my estimation, his age range was somewhere in his mid to late 60’s. A photo of Hans will be displayed on the “people we met” page of this blog.
June 27th
Before we left Cortez we were getting ready to leave and noticed another couple riding a motorcycle was staying at the same hotel. Naturally, we took the time to chat with them and they had ridden from Oregon and were planning to visit Mesa Verde that day. We started chatting and they were also heading out for breakfast. We decided to have breakfast together since one conversation led to another and none of us were going anywhere. Jim and Lynn gave us some tips on where to go since we were heading in the same direction that they had come from. We exchanged information before we left and went on our way. I just want to tell them that as we were riding, my camera bag was sucked right out of my hand and lost somewhere near the Colorado River and I had put the information they gave me in that camera bag. So Lynn and Jim, if you still have my email, please drop us a note so we can get in touch again!
When we left, we rode toward Torrey, Utah to visit Capitol Reef. What an experience! It is just incredibly amazing and overwhelming, driving through the never ending sea of rock formations, the variagated changes in rock colors, the narrow passes through the rock blasted roadways, the passes on high rock mountain roads which overlook breathtaking formations and heart thumping unprotected cliff roads thousands of feet above that you approach with extreme caution as the wind swirls erratically through the mountain passes. One road in particular had my heart racing furiously as John navigated a ridge road which ran approximately a mile across the tops of the mountains with only enough room for the road with little or no shoulder, no guardrails and a single pass in each direction. I wanted to take pictures but literally froze on the bike in fear of moving too much one way or another that might cause us to veer off the narrow strip of roadway. Whoa! Talk about a heart stopping experience….and guess what? We’re still here! Someone upstairs was watching us!
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