We started our day with breakfast at Pepe's Café in Cottonwood. Most everyone had traditional breakfast meals, eggs, pancakes, toast ... Not me! I went for the Huevos Rancheros (or rancher's eggs) and it did not disappoint! The owner was so outgoing and friendly, he greeted everyone at the door and escorted them to their seats. It was old fashioned customer service, you don't see anymore!After breakfast, we took a trip to the National Monument Montezuma Castle, just a few miles from Cottonwood at the end of a side road that winds across flat scrubland and down into the wooded valley formed by Beaver Creek.
It’s a small stream, but a reliable source of water all year round and hence a good locality to establish a home. The Beaver Creek has always been a major focus of life in the Verde Valley. Prehistoric Sinagua dug ditches to carry creek water to irrigate the fields of corn, beans, squash, and cotton they cultivated on flat patches of creek-bottom land. They also hunted animals attracted by the creek and gathered creek side plants.
Montezuma Castle is one of a number of well-preserved ancient dwellings in north central Arizona, including the Wupatki, Tonto, Walnut Canyon, and Tuzigoot National Monuments. It is probably the most spectacular; an imposing 20 room, 5-story structure built, by the Sinagua Indians around the 14th century, into a recess in a white limestone cliff about 70 feet above the ground.
About 50 feet west of the main ruin is a much less well preserved complex named Castle B, consisting of a few rudimentary rooms also on several levels. The land surrounding the path is semi-cultivated, planted with good examples of cacti and other local plants. Since 1951, visitors have not been permitted to climb up to the ruins due to their unstable condition so there is not much to do other than walk the loop trail and take a few photographs but the site is definitely worth a visit.
When first discovered the ruins were thought to be Aztec in origin, hence the name bestowed on them by early explorers, but they are now known to belong to the Sinagua Indian peoples who farmed the surrounding land between the twelfth and fourteenth centuries, before abandoning the area.
The good state of preservation of the ruins is due in part to their protected location, shielded from rain and sun, and also the relatively early designation of the site as a national monument in 1906.
Arizona Sycamore is the most conspicuous tree at the monument, both because of its size (up to 80 feet tall), and by its appearance. The white, brown, and green bark sets this tree apart. The constantly shedding bark creates an ever-changing mosaic of color. While other species of sycamore can be found in North America, in Arizona this tree can only be found along riparian corridors.
The extremely large leaves reveal that this tree is a tree that must have its roots in permanent water in order to survive. The tree uses an amount of water, by weight, equal to the weight of the leaves every hour of the day. The main beams of the Castle are made of sycamore.
The Netleaf Hackberry is a host plant for the caterpilar of the Hackberry Emperor Butterfly. In the fall, the plant produces high-calcium berries that people eat raw or in jelly. The berry can be picked before the first frost when it turns red. The leaves treat indigestion, the bark can be woven into a sturdy pair of sandals, and mix of leaves and bark makes a dark brown and red dye. Mites and fungi often form bushy growths in Hackberry branches called "witches' brooms." The smooth, gray bark of the hackberry becomes warty with age.
The Oneseed Juniper provides fuel, shelter, light, and healing. The berries have fed both humans and animals throughout time. The wood is selected for roof beams, fence, posts, and torches. The Hopi boil the branches for stomach ailments, headaches, and colds. Oneseed Juniper treats pneumonia and indigestion, but too many berries can act as a laxative. The twigs and branches have been burned to purify places and people.
The National Monument also includes Montezuma Well, a flooded limestone sinkhole 55 feet deep formed by the collapse of a large underground cavern, a few miles northeast of the ruins. The well is reached along a winding route through scattered dwellings that becomes unpaved at the side road to the monument, then passes a picnic area and foundations of a Hohokam pit house, now protected by an iron roof, before ending at the parking lot and small cabin with rangers in attendance.
From the parking lot a third of a mile loop trail leads first to the south edge of the well and down to the water’s edge, which is a good place to observe the Sonoran mud turtles. They are currently under threat from an invasion of non-native red eared turtles that inhabit the greenish pool.
The water level in the well is maintained year-round by underground springs and so the lake was an obvious place for the local Indians to live near, as evident from the various ruins scattered around the area, and remnants of an ancient irrigation system.
Under the cliff edge the Sinagua built several stone cliff dwellings, some quite well preserved, while the surrounding rim has other sites that now are just jumbled piles of stones.
The path continues across a plateau and down to the exit channel of the well, where water emerges from the base of a limestone cliff and flows down a short ditch lined with white-barked Arizona sycamore trees before joining the permanent stream of Wet Beaver Creek.
After our adventures, we all rested for the afternoon! That evening, we enjoyed hamburgers over the grill, cooked by Don for dinner! It was still too hot, so we ate inside or RV! It was another great day with family!
No comments:
Post a Comment