mesa verde tours 2022

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Your Guide to the Mesa Verde National Park Tours in 2022

Mesa Verde is a U.S. National Park known for its Cliff Dwellings and ancient architecture that goes back years ago. So history and cultures buff will surely appreciate the park, and the best way to do that is to join a tour or two with the park ranger. 

Table of Contents

Mesa Verde Self-Guided Tours: Can You Tour Mesa Verde On Your Own?

Mesa verde tours.

• Cliff Palace
• Balcony House

How Long Does Each Tour Take?

• The Cliff Palace tour takes approximately 30 minutes. 
• The Balcony House  tour takes approximately 60 minutes. 
• The Long House tour takes approximately 60 minutes.
• Driving time . Mesa Verde National Park is huge; believe me, most of your time will be spent driving.  
• You are required to show up 15 mins earlier before each tour to go over the safety information. 
• There may be delays or any unforeseen circumstances during your tour or after. 
• Sometimes, the tour can go longer than anticipated . 
• 2 hours between the time you book this Cliff Palace tour and a Balcony House tour (i.e., 9:00 AM CP and 11:00 PM BH).
• 3 hours between the time you book this Cliff Palace tour and a Long House tour (i.e., 10:00 AM CP and 1:00 PM or later LH).
• 4 hours between the time you book this Long House tour and a Cliff Palace tour (i.e., 10:00 AM LH and a 2:00 PM or later CP). This will allow you a little extra time to enjoy the sites at Wetherill Mesa and drive to Cliff Palace.

Mesa Verde Tour Cost

• General Admission: $8
• Infant (age 2 and under): $1
• Cancellation Fee: $1 per ticket

How Difficult Is Each Tour?

It’s not so much about hiking to do each cliff-dwelling tour at Mesa Verde National Park. However, each tour requires climbing up and down to go through a cliff dwelling, and the effort can be anywhere from easy and moderate to difficult , depending on your physical conditions. Therefore, the tour is not for you if you have mobility issues or concerning physical health. So plan accordingly before purchasing any tour tickets. 

Best Cliff Dwelling Tours at Mesa Verde

• The Cliff Palace  tour is the easiest and fastest tour, and it’s also the most popular cliff dwelling picture you see when you google Mesa Verde National Park. You go through the tour listening to the ranger’s narrative and move through the cliff dwelling without touching anything. 
• The Balcony House tour requires a better fitness level and takes an hour to complete. It’s also the hardest tour to get tickets because they only offer 3 tours per day with a limited amount of tickets sold. It is one of the most adventurous tours in the park as you move through the cliff dwelling by claiming tall ladders, squeezing your way through a narrow tunnel, etc. See the photo below. This tour lets you touch the dwelling (but not all) as you move through the site. 
• The Long House  tour also takes an hour and is a little further away to drive to it. It’s the least popular Mesa Verde National Park tour and can also be challenging to move through the cliff dwelling. 

How to Book Mesa Verde Tours?

• First and foremost, ensure the cliff dwelling or road is not closed for the date you will visit the park for your tour. 
• You can view the alerts from the official Mesa Verde National Park website .
• Go to the Recreative Gov website and create an account if you do not have one. 
• Sit down and figure out what dates and times you want to do the tour and how many tickets you will need. You can see each Mesa tour hours here:
• All tour reservations can be booked online 14 days in advance at 8 AM Colorado or Mountain Standard Time (MST) . Therefore, 14 days before your desired tour date, set a reminder before 8 AM Colorado time, and get your credit card ready. 
• I suggest you perform a “mock” reservation on a sample date without paying for the reservation to familiarize yourself with the booking process for the tour tickets and quantities you want.
• Simply go to the Recreation Gov Mesa Verde Tour website to book. 
• Remember that the  Balcony House  tour can be sold out in 2-3 minutes, so be strategic and ready to book in front of your computer if this tour is high on your list. 

Best Places to Stay Near Mesa Verde National Park

• I suggest you stay in Cortez to better use your time because Mesa Verde National Park is huge, and you will spend most of your time driving to the park entrance and each cliff dwelling site from the park entrance. 
• Durango is a more interesting town with more attractions, especially its scenic train ride between Durango and Silverton , but it can be far from Mesa Verde. Lodging is also more expensive. 
• If you want to stay in the National Park, there’s a Far View Lodge  inside the park, and they accept pets for $25 per night. 
• Holiday Inn Express Mesa Verde-Cortez – pets are not allowed.
• Hampton Inn Mesa Verde/Cortez – pet fee is $50 per stay, up to 2 pets allowed. 
• Best Western Turquoise Inn & Suites – pet fee is $20 per night, up to 2 pets allowed. However, when I called them, they said $20 per stay, so please double-check. 
• Baymont by Wyndham Cortez – pet fee is $15 per stay, up to 2 pets allowed. 
• Also, some more budgeted  Choice Hotels  are available too. Each hotel charges a pet fee per night instead of per stay, which can add up. 

Are Dogs Allowed In Mesa Verde National Park?

• Never leave your pets in the car unattended. 
• Take turns watching your pet and checking out the cliff dwelling overlook if there are two of you. The Cliff Palace overlook, for example, is not far from the parking lot, so one of you can watch your pet while the other snap a quick photo of the Cliff Palace. A few overlooks along the Cliff Palace loop are just a few steps away from the parking space. 
• Take turns doing each Mesa Verde tour by allowing ample time between switching. 
• Walk the Long House Loop with your pets. The loop is 5-mile long, but you don’t have to do it all. The path is well paved, and some archaeological sites, including the Long House overlook, are where you can enjoy the views with your pets.
• There are also dog kennels near Mesa Verde if you are comfortable. 

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Mesa Verde Guided Tour

Book a Mesa Verde guided tour and learn about the lives of the Ancestral Pueblo people who made Mesa Verde their home for over 700 years, from 600 A.D to 1300.

Sit back and relax while our experienced, knowledgeable archaeologist trained guide takes you around Mesa Verde National Park to some of the most recognized and best-preserved cliff dwelling ruins in the United States. Mesa Verde encompasses over 80 square miles and protects over 5,000 archaeological sites, including the famous Cliff Palace and nearly 600 cliff dwellings, some of which are more than 800 years old. With our guide’s vast knowledge and experience in the area, you will be able to ask questions, read, and listen to your own tour of the park.

My family and I took the Mesa Verde guided tour while visiting Durango. Our guide, Tom, was fantastic. He was very knowledgeable about the park and made sure we got to see all the highlights. Judi, TripAdvisor

This tour is priced per person. Price for the Mesa Verde guided tour includes park fees. All of our vehicles are comfortable with air conditioning for those hot summer months and heated for the winter months.

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Looking to make Mesa Verde tour reservations? Come take a look into the lives of the Ancestral Pueblo peoples who made it their home for over 700 years. From 600 A.D to 1300 they made Mesa Verde their home .  Explore some of the most notable and best preserved the cliff dwelling ruins in the United States that are more than 800 years old.  Mesa Verde protects over 5,000 archaeological sites, including 600 cliff dwellings and the famous Cliff Palace with over 80 square miles of area.

This is a trip of a lifetime for all ages. Any of our  Mesa Verde tours  can be combined with our water adventures, Zip Line Tours or Train ride .  Ticket includes, Lunch, Park Fees and Cliff Palace guided ranger tickets(when in season) and a Personal Guided Tour.

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Cliff Palace

Mesa Verde National Park Tours

Tours begin Monday, May 6. All reservations are available 14 days in advance at 8:00 am MDT. The tour starts 75 minutes from the park entrance at the Cliff Palace Overlook, near the Cliff Palace parking lot.

Cliff Palace is the largest cliff dwelling in North America. Built between 1190 and 1280 CE, Cliff Palace was once home to over 100 people.Today, it stands as a testament to the engineering and artistic achievements of the Ancestral Pueblo people. Visit the park website for a virtual tour of Cliff Palace .

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If you plan on reserving a second tour on the same day, give yourself a minimum of 2 hours between the time you book this Cliff Palace tour and a Balcony House tour (e.g., an 11:00 am Cliff Palace tour requires a 1:00 pm or later Balcony House tour).

Select a date to see a list of times

Need to Know

On this 45-minute ranger-led tour , you will descend uneven stone steps and climb four ladders, with an elevation change of 100 feet (30 m). Total walking distance is 1/4 mile (0.4 km). This video shows tour details and challenges.

From the park entrance, drive 20 miles (32.2 km) to the all-way stop on Chapin Mesa. Turn left. Drive 0.4 miles (0.6 km) and turn left onto the Cliff Palace Loop. Drive 1.7 miles (2.7 km) to the Cliff Palace parking lot.

To make sure you arrive on time, allow 75 minutes to drive to Cliff Palace from the park entrance. Meet the ranger at the Cliff Palace Overlook. You MUST arrive 15 minutes early for a safety and logistics briefing .

Know your physical health and fitness before joining a Cliff Palace tour. Elevations range between 7,000 and 7,500 feet (2134 m and 2286 m) above sea level. Plan for all weather possibilities because conditions can vary.

Wear sturdy hiking shoes or boots and bring a minimum of 1/4 gallon (1 liter) of water per person. Ancestral sites are vulnerable to damage caused by rodents attracted to food crumbs. Food, gum, and chewing tobacco are not permitted within the site during your tour.

There are no height or age restrictions for this tour, but children must be capable of climbing the ladders on their own. Infants must be placed in a carrier and the adults carrying them must be able to maintain mobility and balance while climbing ladders.

Cameras are welcome, but you must be able to carry all of your gear while keeping your hands free to climb the ladders. No tripods are allowed.

May 6 to May 11: 9:00 am, 9:30 am, 10:30 am, 11:00 am, and 2:30 pm. 

May 12 to October 22: 9:00 am to 11:30 am every ½ hour and 12:30 pm to 3:00 pm every ½ hour. 

October 23: Tours are closed for the 2024 season.

$8.00 per person, ages 3 and up. You MUST physically print your tour reservation at home OR download it to your phone to show the ranger before joining the tour. You will NOT be able to join the tour without a valid tour reservation presented. Late arrivals may result in forfeiting your tour. No refunds for late arrivals.

Tour is limited to 50 people 

All tours will be conducted as scheduled. However, any tour may be delayed or cancelled if lightning occurs near the tour location or for a park emergency. 

All tickets are NON-TRANSFERABLE AND NON-REFUNDABLE unless the tour is cancelled by the National Park Service.

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Mesa Verde Tours and Canyon of the Ancients

Tour ancient cliff dwellings with us.

Explore some of the most notable and best-preserved cliff dwellings and archaeological sites in the United States from Durango, CO.

• Hour Glass 6 Hours
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Group Mesa Verde Tour from Durango

Spend 1 hour longer in the park with an optional lunch add-on, all while letting our experienced guides take you back through history on this walk-through time tour so you can just sit back and enjoy the amazing things that Mesa Verde National Park has to offer.

• Hour Glass 7.5 Hours , Lunch Provided

Private Tour of Mesa Verde

Enjoy an intimate experience of Mesa Verde with just your group when you book this private tour! We can customize your itinerary and all of our guides are archeologist trained.

• Hour Glass 5 Hours

Mesa Verde Express Tour With Tickets To Cliff Palace

Discover Mesa Verde with an Archaeologist Trained Guide and go into Cliff Palace.

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Canyons of the Ancients

Follow our knowledgeable guides while they lead you around the Four Corners area to multiple heritage sites.

Tour Mesa Verde Year-Round

Come take a look into the lives of the Ancestral Pueblo peoples who made this part of the United States their home for over 700 years, from 600 A.D to 1300. Explore some of the most notable and best-preserved cliff-dwelling ruins in the United States on a Mesa Verde or Canyon of the Ancients tour.

Mesa Verde National Park encompasses over 80 square miles and protects over 5,000 archaeological sites, including the famous Cliff Palace and nearly 600 cliff dwellings, some of which are more than 800 years old. This is the trip of a lifetime for all ages.

Any of our Mesa Verde tours can be combined with our water adventures for an amazing multi-day experience. Check out our other offerings to combine your adventures.

Our tours include a personal archeologist-trained tour guide, lunch/snacks and water, park entrance fees, and transportation to and from the National Park.  Gratuity for the guide is not included.

Please call 970-259-0289 to speak to a reservationist to get up-to-the-minute updates on all of our tours. Updates are constantly happening in the National Park, for example, road conditions/construction, site closures, and the weather just to name a few. If you are interested in a tour then call our team and we can let you know the current updates.

Why A Guided Tour?

Let our experienced archeologist-trained tour guides take you back through history on this amazing Mesa Verde or Canyon of the Ancients. We take care of all the details so you can just sit back and enjoy this unforgettable experience.

Don’t miss out on any of the amazing things that the Four Corners have to offer. With our guided tour, you will explore ancient ruins and breathtaking views without the hassle of trying to plan everything yourself.

Save time, gas, and entrance fees, and go straight to the sites with our guided tours. All of our vehicles are comfortable with air conditioning for those hot summer months and cozy heat in the winter months. We are here to provide you with the best Mesa Verde and Canyon of the Ancients experience .

This is the trip of a lifetime for all ages. Our Mesa Verde tours can also be combined with our water or 4X4 adventures. The tours include park fees and a personal guided tour of the park. If you would like more information about Mesa Verde National Park call 970-259-0289.

*Please note: Our group-guided tour requires at least two guests to depart. If the tour does not have at least two guests on the tour we would contact you and recommend an alternative tour option. *Gratuity is not included*

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As They Are: Exploring the National Parks

Mesa verde national park: 700 years tour.

For more than 700 years—nearly triple the age of the United States—Ancestral Pueblo people inhabited what we now call Mesa Verde, a cuesta rising above the Colorado Plateau. Beginning in the mid-500s and lasting through the late 1200s, Mesa Verde was constantly inhabited, first by small assemblages of family units in modest pithouses on the mesa top, and ultimately by complex villages climaxing in the dramatic, world-famous cliff dwellings, including the largest cliff dwelling in the American Southwest, Cliff Palace. Then by the end of the 1280s, Mesa Verde was abandoned completely as the Ancestral Pueblo people migrated en masse to the Pueblos along the Rio Grande in what is now New Mexico or to Hopi lands in Arizona.

Sean and I had budgeted 2.5 days to explore Mesa Verde in a series of four tours. While tickets for ranger-led tours into the cliff dwellings are only available two weeks in advance, bus tours operated by concessionaire Aramark were available to book months ahead of time. Usually we’re much more interested in ranger-led options than in those handled by private companies, but we figured that the 700 Years Tour would be a good introduction to the Park on our first morning. And it concluded with a ranger-led tour of Cliff Palace. As we booked the tour in early April, we weren’t necessarily certain we’d be comfortable riding a tour bus with some 30 other people, but we’d cross that bridge if we had to. As it happened, the Delta variant was not yet raging in Colorado when we were there, and everyone was required to be masked, so we felt comfortable. Unfortunately, the Cliff Palace tour was a no-go because road work in the Park made it completely inaccessible in the summer of 2021.

And so on Friday, August 27 we began our exploration of Mesa Verde.

I woke with my alarm at 6am. The tour began at 8am, so that gave me a bit of time to do a little work on the balcony of our room at the lodge. This would be a theme.

But the view was so incredible that it was nice to sip a coffee and work a bit as the sun rose.

Sean woke up, and we both showered and dressed for our morning tour.

We checked in for the tour at the nearby Far View Terrace complex, which contained the concessionaire-operated gift shop, cafeteria, and tour hub.

After checking in, we grabbed breakfast sandwiches and yogurt to eat outside while we waited to board the bus.

Tour guide Lee and bus driver Grady welcomed the twenty or so of us onto the tour bus and oriented us to what was in store over the next several hours. As we pulled out of the parking area and drove up to Park Point, our first stop, Lee shared some of the history of Mesa Verde National Park, which had been established in 1906. At only 52,000 acres, it is relatively small. But it contains at least 5,000 archaeological sites and 600 cliff dwellings.

At Park Point, the highest point on Mesa Verde, we were treated to huge views into four states: Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico. Beginning the tour at Park Point helped to place Mesa Verde into its geographical context.

Beyond the table land of the Mesa Verde cuesta there are major geological markers in almost every direction: the Chuska Mountains to the southwest and the San Juan Mountains to the northeast, Sleeping Ute Mountain immediately to the west, Shiprock in the distance to the south. Even the Bears Ears are visible to the northwest on clear days.

A woman of a certain age remarked to me that this was the first truly clear day that they’d had in weeks. She noted that Shiprock would not have been visible otherwise.

Sean and I were lucky that while we were at Mesa Verde we had very little visibility impact from the wildfires raging in California.

After orienting us to the vista and landmarks, Lee called our attention to the Montezuma Valley north of and below Mesa Verde. Today the valley holds the towns of Mancos and Cortez, Colorado, combined populations around 10,000 people. In the time of the Ancestral Pueblo people, the valley was home to 30,000 people, triple the population.

Lee pointed out the roof of a Walmart in the valley and noted that it was nearly adjacent to one of the most important dwellings found there. It was a reminder that for all of the drama of Mesa Verde and the cliff dwellings, it was only a very small part of a larger Ancestral Puebloan world. The population of Mesa Verde proper was likely never more than 5,000 people, dwarfed by the population even of the adjacent valley.

The Mesa Verde area was the northern extent of an Ancestral Puebloan homeland that encompassed what is now the Four Corners region. From roughly 900 to 1150, the center of Ancestral Puebloan culture was the city at Chaco Canyon, 100 miles or so to the south. Chaco and other urbanized areas of the Southwest—such as the Hohokam culture and their canal-supported city at what is now Phoenix—were themselves the northern extent of an urban-oriented Mesoamerican tradition that reached its climax with the great city of Teotihuacan (~1-500 CE) near what is now Mexico City.

The people of Chaco and Mesa Verde were connected to the people of what is now Mexico by established trade routes. Macaw feathers from tropical forests and shells from the Sea of Cortez are among the artifacts found at Ancestral Puebloan sites.

The earliest Anglo archeologists from the northeastern United States saw this connection clearly in the early years following the Mexican American War (1846-1848). Montezuma Valley is named for Motecuhzoma, the final leader of the Triple Alliance, or Aztec Empire, executed by Hernán Cortés in 1520. An important Ancestral Puebloan archaeological site between Mesa Verde and Chaco is known as Aztec Ruins. While these Anglo-bestowed place names in the Southwest are not properly attributable to the Triple Alliance, they recognize the southward orientation of peoples of the region and the irrelevance of an international border that didn’t exist until the middle of the nineteenth century.

Even as American archaeologists in the latter part of the nineteenth century celebrated the existence of “antiquities of our own” in the recently conquered territory that had been northern Mexico, they also participated in a deliberate attempt to minimize the presence, sophistication, and accomplishments of the Native Peoples of the Americas. For example in 1866, Lewis Henry Morgan, father of American Anthropology, argued that Motecuhzoma was not an emperor but merely a warlord. (This assessment would likely have shocked Cortés).

This minimization of the population, cultures, and accomplishments of the Native Peoples of the Americas continues into the twenty-first century. Quite simply, the more sophisticated the Indigenous societies of the Americas, the more monstrous the genocide. Minimizing the cohesion of Indigenous polities makes the invasion seem benign.

Names and narratives are deeply part of the Mesa Verde story in the twenty-first century. The people of Mesa Verde, Chaco, Aztec Ruins, and thousands of other sites the Southwest were known throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries as the “Anasazi.” I was curious whether Lee would address the name issue. He did early in the tour and quite well. “Anasazi” is a Navajo word. The Navajo and Utes inhabited the region after the departure of the Ancestral Pueblo people. And so it was in a Navajo context that the cliff dwellings of Mesa Verde were originally defined. Anasazi means “ancient people” or “ancient enemy,” and has a negative connotation. In the 1990s, the modern Pueblo people requested that the National Park Service (and others) cease using the term Anasazi to refer to the peoples of Chaco, Mesa Verde, and elsewhere. Because no one knows how these people referred to themselves, the preferred name is “Ancestral Pueblo.”

“Ancestral Pueblo” is important also because it underscores that the people of Mesa Verde are the direct ancestors of the modern Pueblo people. Pervasive narratives around the “mysterious vanishing” of the people of Mesa Verde purposefully ignore that, while we may not fully understand why the Ancestral Pueblo people migrated from the Four Corners to the Rio Grande, we certainly know they didn’t vanish into thin air. They simply moved to Taos Pueblo, Laguna Pueblo, and the dozens of other Pueblo communities.

The Hopi, who trace their ancestors to the Ancestral Pueblo, call Mesa Verde “The Place of Songs.”

We climbed back on the bus and descended from Park Point down the gradual slope of the cuesta. As we headed south on Chapin Mesa, we passed through an area that was extensively burned in 2002. Much of the surface of Mesa Verde has seen wildland fire damage in the previous fifty years. The National Park Service at this Park has to walk a careful balance in fire management. Although occasional fire is part of the ecosystem, it can endanger the archaeological sites that are the Park’s priority to protect.

On Chapin Mesa, we stopped at the site of a pithouse from early in the era when the Ancestral Pueblo people inhabited Mesa Verde.

This is the site of a pithouse, one of the earliest permanent dwellings on Mesa Verde. The family that lived here was not isolated, but was part of a community. Their neighbors lived in at least seven pithouses nearby, and small fields or gardens were probably located close to the homes, wherever growing conditions were good. They raised corn, beans, and squash, hunted animals, and gathered an impressive array of wild plants. – National Park Service sign

Our tour disembarked the bus, entered the corrugated metal enclosure protecting the pithouse, and spread out around it.

Architectural details, such as the holes that would have held the posts supporting the roof, were still present.

As was part of a low, dividing wall.

In this 1,400-year-old pithouse, we could see some of the elements that would come to much fuller fruition in later Ancestral Puebloan architecture: the slight submersion, the central hearth, the cluster of community dwellings.

After our brief visit to the pithouse, we climbed back onto the bus for a short drive to Square Tower House.

As we approached, an NPS law enforcement vehicle passed us with siren blaring. It stopped at the parking area for Square Tower House. The bus pulled over and we disembarked, intending to walk out to the cliff dwelling’s overlook.

There were multiple Park Rangers onsite. Lee asked one what the situation was. Apparently there was some sort of emergency with a visitor on that morning’s tour to the cliff dwelling. The ranger asked Lee to keep our tour group away so that they would have room for whatever emergency procedure might be necessary.

This was Friday morning, and Sean and I had tickets for the tour into the cliff dwelling for Sunday morning. The woman of a certain age who had commented on how clear the skies were earlier pointed out the access ladders for the cliff dwelling. They were attached to the cliff face opposite. She noted that the ladders followed the same access route that the Ancestral Puebloans had used to reach Square Tower House. She said that particularly when we descended the lower ladder on our tour, we should look for the hand and foot holds hewn into the cliff.

I wasn’t thrilled at the prospect of the ladders and rope access. But that was a reserve of bravery to find on another day. Meanwhile, it was back on the bus for our next stop.

Up next was another mesa top site. This time a series of three subsequent villages—from 900, 1100, and 1075 successively—each built upon the foundation of the others. This tradition of abandonment, return, and reuse was widespread at Ancestral Puebloan sites.

The third and final village was built around 1075, just before construction of the cliff dwellings began. While the village’s foundations and subterranean architecture are very well preserved, there was little stone rubble found at the site. It is quite possible that the stones used for this village were repurposed in the nearby cliff dwellings.

Ancestral Puebloan kivas likely developed from earlier pithouses. Kivas, however, were likely public spaces—religious, ceremonial, or political. Like the earlier pithouses, they featured a central hearth. Platform benches encircle the space. Depressions for foot drumming highlight the floor.

Post-excavation, it was easy to see how the newer kiva (left, above) had replaced and partly filled the older kiva.

We climbed back into the bus for the short drive to the intersection of Fewkes Canyon and Cliff Canyon, where multiple cliff dwellings, including the most famous, Cliff Palace, were visible. After not being able to see Square Tower House because of the emergency earlier, we’d waited all morning to see a cliff dwelling. Now, here they were.

Even at a distance, the size of Cliff Palace dwarfed the other cliff dwellings near it.

The evocative names—Cliff Palace, Mummy House, Fire Temple—have nothing to do with what the Ancestral Pueblo people would have called these places. Some of the names we have for the cliff dwellings are romantic (Cliff Palace, Fire Temple) while others are merely descriptive (Balcony House, Long House). Others are named for something found there (Mug House, Mummy House).

As our eyes became accustomed to seeing the dwellings, we began to notice more structures along the peripheries.

What led the Ancestral Pueblo people of Mesa Verde to move down into the cliff alcoves after some 600 years of living on the surface of the cuesta? We don’t know for certain, and the way that the National Park Service has discussed it has evolved over time (more on that in a subsequent post). But we do know that the construction of the cliff dwellings was something of a climax event. A segment of people on Mesa Verde or in the region moved into cliff dwellings during a period of roughly a century between the collapse of the the power center at Chaco Canyon and the complete emptying of the people of the Mesa Verde region.

Intriguingly, the structure known as Sun Temple (above) was built so late in the Mesa Verde era that it was unfinished at the time of the depeopling. It is similar in style to the structures at Chaco, and some archaeologists suspect it may have been a late, last-ditch effort to assert the power of Chaco at a Mesa Verde being abandoned.

Whatever the reason, there were many advantages to living in the cliff alcoves rather than in the canyon bottoms or on the mesa top. The dwellings were cool in summer and warm in winter. They were defensible. They were closer to water, both seeps in the cliff walls and springs and creeks in the canyons. However, even as the people moved into the cliff dwellings, they continued to tend agricultural fields on the mesa top.

Even from across Fewkes Canyon, we could see the remains of pigment on what had been interior walls of a structure in Fire Temple.

Our fellow tourists were mostly older than we were (although there was a family with two kids). I most enjoyed the woman of a certain age who knew a lot about the flora and fauna of the region and who pointed things out to us. We were a little baffled by the folks who didn’t know whether you could enter the cliff dwellings. How do you make it to the Park and onto a tour without having absorbed how to visit one of the dwellings? Lee patiently explained that there were tours led by National Park Rangers and that one cliff dwelling on Long Mesa was accessible without a tour.

We hopped back onto the bus and headed to the other side of Fewkes Canyon to Sun Temple.

The name Sun Temple didn’t come from any particular cosmological alignment, but from a decorative stone at one edge of the structure.

Whoever had been building Sun Temple before the work was abandoned, it was clearly intended to be impressive.

Near Sun Temple, we had a better view of Cliff Palace, the largest cliff dwelling in the Southwest.

Normally, Cliff Palace would be bustling with tours, including ours. But the road construction above it had cut it off, allowing for relatively rare photos of it without any visitors.

After everyone got their photos of Cliff Palace, we boarded the bus and drove to our last stop, the Chapin Mesa Historical District.

The Historical District was the original hub of visitor activity at Mesa Verde National Park and boasts a suite of buildings from the first half of the twentieth century constructed in a rustic Southwest architectural style. The area was developed under the guidance of one of the National Park’s earliest superintendents, Jesse Nusbaum, who had been hand-picked by legendary National Park Service founder, Stephen Mather, to improve the visitor experience, interpretation, and educational programs at Mesa Verde National Park.

Here on a veranda overlooking Spruce Tree House, Lee wrapped up our morning’s tour.

Spruce Tree House was also closed to visitors (and will be for the foreseeable future) after the Park Service discovered that the immense slab of rock forming the alcove’s ceiling is unstable. The Park Service continues to work on ways to stabilize it so that it doesn’t suddenly collapse and destroy Spruce Tree House.

We boarded the bus one last time to return to Far View Terrace. We tipped Lee and thanked him as we exited the bus. Although it was a concessionaire-operated tour, I thought Lee did a really fine job.

We grabbed a lunch of paninis and salad to go from the cafe at Far View Terrace and took it back to our room. There we sat on our little balcony and enjoyed the privacy and view while we ate.

I remarked that I could just sit and watch the view all day. But we had more adventures ahead of us that afternoon. We had tickets for the 3pm tour into Long House. After our morning of viewing them from the mesa top, we were excited to actually get to enter a cliff dwelling.

Juan, taking care of Elsa back in Chicago, posted an update to Instagram.

Further Reading:

Grant Noble, David, ed., The Mesa Verde World: Explorations in Ancestral Pueblo Archaeology, School of American Research Press, Santa Fe, NM, 2006.

Lekson, Stephen H., A History of the Ancient Southwest, School for Advanced Research Press, Santa Fe, NM, 2008.

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AARP’s Guide to Mesa Verde National Park

A thrilling collection of ancient canyon-carved cliff dwellings welcomes visitors in colorado.

T.J. Olwig,

Most of the country’s 63 national parks  are beloved for their wild and rugged beauty, but Mesa Verde National Park (MVNP) is a cultural treasure unlike any other. Located in the Four Corners region of southwestern Colorado, it preserves the heritage and hand-built architectural accomplishments of the Ancestral Pueblo people, an ancient civilization that produced awe-inspiring handiwork between 550 and 1300 A.D. Home to 5,000 archaeological sites, including 600 canyon-carved cliff dwellings, the 52,485-acre park, strewn with verdant clusters of pinyon, juniper and Gambel oak trees, safeguards the United States’ largest archaeological preserve. ​

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Park location:  The Four Corners region in southwestern Colorado

Acres:  52,485

Highest peak:  Park Point’s Fire Lookout Tower, at 8,572 feet above sea level

Lowest valley:  Soda Canyon, about 6,000 feet above sea level

Miles of trails:  20-plus miles over 12 trails

Main attraction:  Cliff Palace

Cost:  $30 per-vehicle entrance fee May until Oct. 23 ($20 with the annual Seniors Pass), valid for seven consecutive days; $20 per vehicle from Oct. 23 through April

Best way to see it:  Ranger-led tours of the cliff dwellings

When to go:  May through September, when the park’s most significant sites are open. September has the best weather.

President Theodore Roosevelt established the park in 1906, and in 1978, MVNP was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site, along with  Yellowstone National Park , the first such accreditations given in the United States. The region’s first Spanish explorers gave the area its name — Mesa Verde is Spanish for “green table” — inspired by its vast and lush mountainous shrublands. Geologists will tell you that MVNP is technically a “cuesta” (not a “mesa”), due to its sun-tilted topography, which the Ancestral Puebloans used to grow corn, their primary food.

​For reasons unknown, by the late 1200s, following seven centuries of building and harvesting, the Ancestral Puebloans had all but deserted the cliffs, canyons and villages of modern-day MVNP. While there were surely plenty of explorers in the area in the years after, it wasn’t put on the map until a snowy December day in 1888, when local ranchers Charlie Mason and Richard Wetherill spotted Cliff Palace — the largest cliff dwelling in the park and the main attraction. Fast-forward to 2022, and this sacred Indigenous site, where 100-mile views into Arizona, Utah and New Mexico can be had on clear days, attracts close to 600,000 visitors annually. ​

An interpretive sign in the park offers this plea to visitors from T.J. Atsye, a park ranger and direct descendant of the people who once lived here: “To Pueblo people, this is still a living place. We make pilgrimages back to Mesa Verde to visit the ancestors and gather strength and resilience from them. I ask you to please visit with respect. If you’re genuine, and true, and respectful, the ancestors will welcome you.”

​Easy to navigate, MVNP is divided into two distinct sections: Chapin Mesa, which features two short, drivable roads and where parkgoers spend most of their time, and Wetherill Mesa, highlighted by a paved 5-mile walking loop. You won’t need more than a day to experience the park, but to explore its best sites — Cliff Palace, for example — you need to purchase tickets for ranger tours in advance of your arrival.

​ Plan Your Trip

The nearest international airport is 248 miles southeast in Albuquerque, though it offers no nonstop connections to the area near the park. Flying into Denver International Airport is a better option, with at least one daily nonstop flight to the gateway city of Cortez (10 miles west of the park) and multiple flights to Durango-La Plata County Airport (49 miles east of it), just outside Durango.

​Most visitors, however, drive to MVNP as part of an extended road trip that includes stops in  Arches  and Canyonlands national parks in Utah and other attractions in scenic southwestern Colorado, including national monuments and the San Juan Skyway, a scenic, 236-mile mountain loop through Telluride and other charming former mining towns.

​MVNP’s entrance is on the park’s northern edge, directly off U.S. Highway 160, with the lone visitor center nearby. To maximize your day, give yourself 30 minutes at the center to take in its interactive exhibits, small museum, bookstore and gift shop before venturing into the park.

​From the entrance, it’s about an hour’s drive on MVNP’s slow and serpentine main thoroughfare to the cliff dwellings at Chapin and Wetherill mesas, in the park’s far southern quadrant. Be sure to stop at the Park Point overlook, MVNP’s highest point (8,572 feet), for scenic views of the San Juan Mountains’ 14,000-foot peaks. You might even spot a golden eagle riding the warm air currents above the Mancos Valley.

​The thoroughfare forks at mile marker 15 (near Far View Lodge), with offshoots leading to each of the two mesas. From Far View Lodge, it’s a 5-mile drive to Chapin Mesa’s two loop roads and 12 miles to Wetherill’s loop trail. The road to Wetherill Mesa, the park’s less-visited side, closes at the end of October and reopens in May. Chapin Mesa is open year-round; its cliff dwellings can’t be toured in the winter, but many of the dwellings in both mesas can still be seen from the park’s overlooks.

​The season is crucial when planning your trip to MVNP. “April and May are nice, and the temperatures are comfortable, but you can get snow,” says Holly Tatnall, an interpretative guide for park concessionaire Aramark Tours. “September is going to give you the best, most consistent weather in the unpredictable Rockies.” 

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​Summertime temps range from the mid- to upper 80s, so bring plenty of water (you’ll be driving at between 7,000 and 8,400 feet) and stay hydrated. With cool mornings and 65- to 75-degree temperatures, early fall delivers prime camping conditions. Frigid mountain air sweeps through MVNP in winter, shutting down the park tours. When the most popular sites reopen for tours in April, temperatures are still chilly (with highs in the low 50s), before jumping into the 70s in May.

​There’s limited to no cell phone service inside the park.

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​ Where to Stay and Eat

The closest hotel is the moderately priced Far View Lodge, in the heart of the park, 15 miles from the entrance and perched atop a mesa, 8,250 feet above sea level. Its 150 rooms sport private balconies perfect for sunset and wildlife viewing (elk, coyotes, mule deer). Reserve wheelchair-accessible rooms when you book. Metate, the hotel’s signature restaurant (it serves only dinner), offers contemporary American plates, including pan-seared rainbow trout.

​Far View Terrace, just a short walk from the hotel, serves coffee and snacks at the Mesa Mocha Espresso Bar, as well as cafeteria-style breakfast and lunch (think omelets and sandwiches). Both the hotel and terrace are open from April to late October. In Chapin Mesa, the Spruce Tree Terrace Café serves basic concession food and stays open through December, then reopens in spring.

​Four miles beyond the park entrance, in a picturesque canyon of native Gambel oaks, you can sleep under some of the darkest skies you’ll experience in a national park at the 267-site  Morefield Campground  (open April through October). Amenities include picnic tables, firepits and 15 electrical hookups for RVs. There’s also a full-service village with a gift shop, grocery store, showers and all-you-can-eat pancakes at the Knife Edge Café. Outside the park, in nearby Cortez, the affordable Retro Inn, open year-round, offers brightly colored, accessible rooms and complimentary breakfast.

​ Things to Do

​ See the biggest cliff dwellings.  These ancient marvels are the park’s main draw. You can explore a handful of them, but only on ranger-led tours (the one exception: the self-guided Step House tour in Wetherill Mesa), most running from mid-April to late October. Tickets cost $8 to $25 per dwelling and can be purchased up to 14 days in advance. While the tours are not wheelchair-friendly or suited for those with physical limitations, anyone can view the dwellings from good vantage points. 

​The park’s absolute must-see is Cliff Palace in Chapin Mesa, near the start of the 6-mile Cliff Palace Loop Road. This rock, mortar and timber-constructed village, built in the 13th century, is jaw-dropping, with its 150 rooms, 23 circular kivas used for ceremonial gatherings, intricate ventilation system, and remarkable “dry stack” masonry. “Their walls are within 2 degrees of square, but we didn’t find any builder’s squares,” says park ranger David Nighteagle. “It’s a testimony to how well they [Ancestral Puebloans] could lay stone.” At its peak, the alcove settlement, which Nighteagle likens to “walking in downtown Manhattan and seeing all of these big buildings,” could have housed upwards of 150 people. Touring it involves climbing uneven steps and ladders, but those with physical limitations can get a good view of the site, and a terrific postcard shot, from Sun Temple on Mesa Top Loop Road.

​Just shy of 2 miles farther down Cliff Palace Road is Balcony House, with 38 well-preserved rooms as well as kivas and plazas. Another 13th-century masterpiece, it’s considered the park’s most adventurous tour due to its tight passageways, 32-foot entrance ladder, jagged stone steps, and 60-foot ascent up an open cliff face. It’s for thrill seekers and the physically fit, but the easy Soda Canyon Overlook Trail (1.2 miles round trip) affords an alternate view.

​Square Tower House, on Mesa Top Loop Road in Chapin Mesa, the park’s tallest dwelling, stands 26 feet high. Inhabited during the mid-1200s, the three-story structure features intact wooden beams and an original clay kiva roof. If the strenuous mile-long hike to tour the house deters you, get a bird’s-eye view of the dwelling from the overlook here, which provides one of the best vistas in all of MVNP.

​Due to rockfall, Spruce Tree House in Chapin Mesa, the park’s best-preserved dwelling, has been closed since 2015. But snag a stellar aerial view of the park’s third-largest cliff dwelling from the wheelchair-friendly porch at the Chapin Mesa Archeological Museum (currently closed for renovations), located less than a mile before the start of the two loop roads. Tucked beneath a sandstone archway, the dwelling was constructed between 1211 and 1278 A.D. When ranchers discovered it in 1888, they climbed down a large Douglas spruce tree (now called a Douglas fir) to enter it, thus the name.

​In Wetherill Mesa, tour Long House, the park’s second-largest dwelling, highlighted by a dance plaza and multiple seep springs that provided the Ancestral Puebloans with water. From the beginning of the paved, 5-mile Long House Loop Trail near the mesa parking lot, walk 1.5 miles to the Long House trailhead. From there, it’s an arduous 2.25-mile hike (round trip) to the dwelling.

​For a more leisurely stroll (just a 1-mile loop), the mesa’s wheelchair- and bike-friendly loop trail passes through an eerie-looking burned forest that leads to the Nordenskiöld Site No. 16 trailhead. To view the two-level, 50-room village, excavated by a Swedish geologist in 1891, walk the flat, half-mile gravel path to an overlook.

​Near the parking lot is MVNP’s only cliff dwelling that doesn’t require a tour ticket, the easy-to-walk-around Step House, carved inside a 300-foot alcove. When excavated, the dwelling housed stunning handcrafted baskets in its six pit houses (insulated semisubterranean homes), evidence that Ancestral Puebloans occupied it six centuries before the park’s most famous dwellings were constructed, circa the 13th century. Access it via a moderate, half-mile offshoot (1-mile round trip) at the beginning of the loop trail.

​ Drive the Mesa Top Loop.  This 6-mile, 11-stop scenic road, which runs parallel to the Cliff Palace Loop in Chapin Mesa, traces the Ancestral Puebloans’ seven-century footprint in and around the park with rousing overlooks and stops at various archaeological sites. At the loop’s end, you’ll see Sun Temple (1275 A.D.), a large D-shaped complex that experts believe served as an observatory for astronomical events, such as the winter solstice, that guided the Puebloans’ planting and harvesting activities.

​ Go hiking.  MVNP has a few noteworthy short  hiking trails , though the rough, challenging terrain means they aren’t suitable for the mobility-impaired. In Chapin Mesa, the half-mile Farming Terrace Trail near Cedar Tree Tower provides a window into the Ancestral Puebloans’ unique agricultural system, with its check dams and terraces. From the Spruce Tree House Overlook in Chapin Mesa, the steep Petroglyph Point Trail (2.4 miles) loops through a fragrant pinyon-juniper forest, where hikers slip between mammoth boulders en route to a 35-foot-wide rock-art panel with more than 30 figures (human and animal), spirals and handprints.

​Closer to the park’s entrance, three trailheads, ranging from easy to difficult, start at the Morefield Campground: Knife Edge (2 miles), an ideal trek for savoring Colorado’s pastel sunsets; Point Lookout (2.2 miles), replete with views of the snowcapped San Juan and La Plata ranges; and Prater Ridge (7.8 miles), a challenging, two-loop combo that splits Prater and Morefield canyons above Montezuma Valley, where an estimated 35,000 people lived in the 1200s.

​ Gateway Towns

The Old West town of Durango, 36 miles east of MVNP on U.S. Highway 160, lures the bulk of parkgoers with its charming shops and art galleries, eclectic restaurants and microbreweries, outdoor recreation options, and rich railroad history. Indeed, a train ride aboard the  Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad  is a must. From downtown Durango, the 1880s steam engine winds through the spellbinding San Juan Mountains, skirting the edge of cliffs and crossing lofty bridges over the clear and ever-flowing Animas River, chugging its way to the historic mining town of Silverton. It’s a thrilling nine-hour, round-trip adventure (May-October), with two hours spent exploring Silverton. Even the vision-impaired enjoy the ride, hearing the steam whistle as the vintage locomotive pulls the train up steep grades. For alpine aromas and the best views, book a gondola seat.

​Splurge on a stay at the 15-room Rochester Hotel (with multiple wheelchair-accessible rooms). Built in 1892, the former boarding house-turned-boutique hotel recently reopened downtown following a modern makeover. Just two blocks away, the 88-room Strater Hotel is moderately priced and feels like you’re sleeping in a museum, with period wallpaper and American Victorian walnut antiques awash in a building dating to 1887.

​Start your morning with a breakfast burrito at Durango Coffee Company on downtown’s Main Street. Around the corner, for lunch, munch on mouthwatering al pastor tacos or a chicken torta at the Cuevas Tacos food truck. Come dinnertime, sink your teeth into a juicy grass-fed burger topped with Belford cheese at the James Ranch Grill, 10 miles north of downtown on U.S. Highway 550. Cream Bean Berry’s delicate artisan ice cream on Main Street will satisfy anyone’s sweet tooth. Across the street, sip a cold one at Carver Brewing Company, one of Colorado’s first brewpubs.

​Blink twice and you might miss the closest town to MVNP — Mancos, a sleepy dot on the map 8 miles east of the park on U.S. 160. Accommodations are sparse here, but the moderately priced Western-themed lodge rooms at the Starry Nights Ranch Bed & Breakfast make for a homey overnight. Before heading into the park, fuel up for the day at the Absolute Bakery & Café on the Mesa Verde Stack, an egg-and-hash browns combo slathered with homemade green chile. At lunchtime, Chef Ben’s Cubano Sandwich is a must-try.

​Ten miles west of the park on U.S. 160 is Cortez, a terrific launch point for driving the 116-mile Trail of the Ancients Scenic and Historic Byway, with its multiple national landmarks. The town’s lodging options are mostly hotels — the Holiday Inn Express Mesa Verde-Cortez has a pool and wheelchair-accessible rooms. For home-cooked comfort foods, order the country fried chicken or elk shepherd’s pie at the Loungin’ Lizard cantina.

T.J. Olwig is a St. Louis-based travel writer who has penned stories for  BBC Travel ,  Delta Sky ,  Missouri Life  and  Virtuoso Life.

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