Thursday, August 16, 2012

Manitou Cliff Dwellings in Colorado Springs.

After we left Pike's Peak Saturday morning we skipped down the road a bit to the Manitou Cliff Dwellings. I have always wanted to see Mesa Verde but right now that's just a little too far away but these were a good alternative. 


If you are ever looking for a good place to go to on vacation I would highly recommend Colorado Springs. There are so many things to do in this area that are so close together. We were able to hit four different locations in one day and we still took an afternoon break at the hotel. 


We were able to walk through most of the structures and see some of the artifacts and get explanations about how the "apartments" were set up. These cliff dwellings were built by the ancient Anasazi people. Yap's checking out some grain grinding stones above and a grain bin is below. 





This is part of the kiva, an underground ceremonial area. 


This is a wall of a three family apartment. The holes are where logs would have been that created the floors and ceilings. The rooms themselves were extremely small; I'd guess roughly 6x6 in some cases with the ceilings being less than 5 feet tall. Either the Anasazi Indians 


Here we are patiently waiting to climb a ladder to check out a second story room. 





These are some petroglyphs that were roughly 12 feet above the ground. The meanings aren't clear but are believed to be symbols for rain. 



Not only are there ancient cliff dwellings at the Manitou site but there is also a pueblo that has been renovated into a museum/gift shop. 




I have ALWAYS wanted to try and bake bread in one of these! Anyone willing to build one in my back yard? LOL 


Bowls 1300 A.D. 
Aren't. These. Gorgeous?!
While some women drool over Fiesta ware, THIS is what I wish I had in my cabinets! I am such a sucker for a beautiful artifact. 


By now it's about lunchtime on our Saturday Colorado excursion and we still had two places left to go that day! We squeezed a lot into one day but there are so many things to do in this town that we could go back for another weekend and visit totally different places! 

Big thumbs up for Colorado Springs! 

2 comments:

  1. Shoot, I have been by this place at least three times in my life but never actually seen it. Trying to catch up on all my blog pals, if just the posts from today or the last ones, so I can tell everyone I am still alive. The girls are at school for their second day, and this is my very first morning in what seems like forever to myself to do what I want. I'm sure someone outside has a whole list in his head of what I should be doing, but that's just too darned bad. I did get one load of laundry done, and I will start picking up stuff soon, but right now I'm just enjoying the semi peace (someone is running a chain saw outside) and quiet! :-) Hugs!

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    1. I am soooo looking forward to the first day of school! Even with Yahoo home, my days will have a lot more peace and quiet to them!!

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