Canyon de Chelly

My first visit to Canyon de Chelly (pronounced "de shay") in Arizona was in 1986. It was a passing view, barely remembered, except I was impressed that this canyon was more beautiful than the Grand Canyon precisely because it's not so immense. It is intimate and inviting.

Looking down from an overlook.

Spring and fall are the best times to see this gouge through ancient deep red sandstone. But even late April didn't guarantee we would have great weather. It snowed lightly, rained, sleeted, and hailed those little snow balls that always remind me of Dippin Dots ice cream.

During the intervening years I had acquired more knowledge about geology, history, and archeology that enhanced my later experience. If you want to feel the power of the tragedies that permeate the walls of Canyon de Chelly, read Hampton Side's book - Blood and Thunder. It is a biography of the famous Kit Carson, frontiersman and army scout, who, in his later years led the round up of the Navajo people and forced them on a death march to Fort Sumner and a reservation called the Bosque Redondo: Navajo Trail of Tears

On Friday afternoon, in the rain and sleet, my friend Becky and I drove along the edges of the canyon to all the overlook points. We had planned to take a tour into the canyon, available only with Navajo guides in jeeps. But we cancelled it, hoping the weather reports would prove true and we'd have a better experience on Saturday. Unfortunately, in spite of great technological advances, weather reports aren't always accurate.

Saturday morning was bleak. My car was covered by pebbles of snow on top of a frozen skin of ice. We were the only tour participants and were given pink blankets and army rain slickers. Both of us wore every warm thing we'd brought on the trip, and still we were freezing. The 'jeep' was an Austrian army Pinzgaur, a six-wheeled all terrain vehicle designed for moving troops. Our Navajo driver, Harold, was excellent and we never got stuck, though we passed others who were. The river was running high, but not high enough to stop that machine from plowing through. We were peppered by rain in spite of the tarp overhead, and the pink blankets were caked with red mud by the end of the trip.

The tower in the middle of this photo has three
intact levels. Two skeletons were found in the
highest room, which gave the canyon it's name
Canyon del Muerto, Canyon of Death.

Ours was only the half day tour so we went into the north branch called Canyon del Muerto, as far as the Standing Cow ruin. It was named after a blue-faced cow painted by a Navajo artist on the canyon wall. Other ruins in that canyon included the Antelope ruins and the First Ruin, all buildings left behind by the Anasazi (a Navajo word for ancient ones) or as they are called by archeologists - the Ancestral Puebloans. The buildings were constructed of carefully fashioned sandstone blocks, fitted together so well that little clay was used to hold them together. Abandoned in the 1200s they still stand, some even have roofs supported by wooden beams. There are other ruins further up the canyon that can be seen on the full day tour, or from the overlooks. Canyon del Muerto (of Death) is so named because two women's skeletons were found in a tower-ruin and further upstream there is a cave where over 100 Navajo women and children were massacred by Spanish soldiers in 1805.

On the second half of our tour, the weather improved and the sun peeked out of the clouds on occasion. We drove upriver, sometimes in the river, to the White House, the most famous of Canyon de Chelly's ruins. It is accessible by foot from the rim of the canyon, and is the only one the public can visit without a Navajo guide. A huge ruin, it consists of a building on the ground and many in a cave above. At the height of life there, the lower building was three to four stories and reached up the wall to the cave buildings. The lowest walls are as thick as any castle wall in Europe, built specifically to support an enormous structure.

White House ruin

It was thrilling for me to come back to Canyon de Chelly after all those years, to experience it from the inside as well. The tours are a bit pricy, but worth every penny. The Navajo Nation also runs horseback and guided hiking tours and they allow backpacking and overnights in the canyon with a guide. During the summer months, many Navajos live in the canyon and farm. The sound of tractors and animals is all part of the experience.

The road into the canyon.

After rain and snow, little ponds form on the mesa tops.

Ancient red sandstone cliffs

The intimate canyon

Indie Travel - In Transit

The word travel comes from a French word meaning “work” and sometimes, getting there is work. Between crowded buses, long airline delays, overnight trains and crazy rickshaw rides, transportation can be stressful, but it can also be a rewarding part of the tip. Tell us about a time when the journey became more important than the destination.




I am on a journey now, a tour of the east coast in the fall. That was the primary objective, to experience a hardwood forest in all it's autumn glory and take lots of pretty pictures. 


It's been a great experience: to wander down the Blue Ridge Parkway, watch snow fall on golden and red trees in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, dig up potatoes while trees shed leaves by the millions so it sounded like a light rain falling. 


The photos have been fun to compose and a few have turned out exquisitely. 

Appomattox looming out of the fog.

The non-objective was to enjoy the trip and for the first time in my life just wander more or less aimlessly and see what I want to see, stay as long as I like. 


Most of us have experienced a father (or mother) who always had to be somewhere, and the drives to get there were long and arduous. One trip when my sisters were still in grade school was particularly memorable. (My father hated to stop. I think if we'd been boys he'd have asked us to pee out the window rather than make a pitstop.) My sister kept saying she felt sick. He told her to suck it up, hold it in, that she wasn't really sick, etc. Then in a spectacular feat of projectile vomiting, she blasted the back of his head. 


On those long trips I always wanted to explore the old dilapidated houses that appeared along the roadside, see if there was anything like a long-dead girl's dolly, or maybe some rusty old tool that no one even remembers what it was used for. Or stop at the attractions to 
see the live alligators, the pit full of rattlesnakes, or the Pony Express Station. 

Reconstructed Appomattox Courthouse

Now, I'm on my own trip, all by myself, and if I see something of interest, I pull over, take pictures, look around, explore, ask about it. Just this morning I drove by a National Park I didn't even know existed. It's where the Civil War ended. It was out in the middle of nowhere Virginia, down a weaving two lane road I happened to be on. The morning was foggy and wet. The little town of Appomattox Courthouse appeared as a ghost rising from the wet forest. It was closed. I went on to the next town, five miles down the road, had breakfast, came back, and paid my $3 to get in. A lovely place, chock full of history and artifacts, and I had it mostly to myself. 

The McLean home where the terms of surrender
were signed in the living room. 

I remember the author/historian Hampton Sides telling a personal story. His best friend in high school was the son of Shelby Foote, author of The Civil War: A Narrative. The boys were upstairs playing music too loudly and stomping around. Shelby banged on the door and in his meanest voice said "Cut it out boys!! I'm workin on Appomattox!". Hampton said he worked on Appomattox for almost four years.  After seeing the site, wandering the museums, talking to the lonely chilled rangers, I have no doubt that it took four years to write the section on the final days of the war. 






It was never my objective to see several of the plantation homes owned by Presidents, or  where the Civil War ended, it's just been a part of the journey, a few of the things I've run across while in transit.  

Fog, tree, grave.

View from inside the jail.

Union Army's portable printing machine for
printing the pardons for over 22,000 Confederate soldiers.

The Confederacy's final shots were
fired from this front yard.