Mesa Verde and the Petroglyph Trail

There was rain again this morning.  So, no mountain biking for us.  Instead we decided to drive out to Mesa Verde to see what we would see.  This is what we could see from the front door of the RV - weather on the way.

The drive to Mesa Verde is gorgeous.  We were here several years ago, and had forgotten what a scenic place it is.

A wet flower at an over look.

It hailed on us driving up to the visitor's center at the top.  Since we'd done the ranger tour of the ruins in 2009, we decided to just do a hike.  We decided to do the Petroglyph hike.  It was a really rocky, rooty, up and down trail.  Here is Jim contemplating another set of steps.

It's pretty up there.  The trail is a loop, but because we were dummies, we didn't get the trail guide, so we didn't know at what point the trail turned back to the visitor's center.  This was becoming important data to have, since it was raining on us.

So, we bailed, and just did an out and back.  Note to self, get the trail guide.  This is a ruin on the trail.  The Ancestral Puebloans used to live here.

Timing is everything.  We got back to the truck before the skies opened up.

It's an amazing drive back down the hill, as well.

Tomorrow we are up and out to Moab.   We made the reservations months ago, we're now back on our original itinerary which was blown up by our stay in Kanab and then the side trip to Albuquerque.  It will be a completely different weather pattern than what this part of Colorado is experiencing.  Farmington received golf ball sized hail today.  With the advent of a strong El Nino, it's expected that it will rain for the rest of the year, which is kind of a bummer.  Moab will be close to 100!  Ack!