Mesa Verde:The Cliff City Found by Chasing Cattle

Lina: Would you believe if I told you that archaeologists figured out where an entire civilization disappeared to because of turkey bones?

Ralf: They followed this weird trail to a cliffside city in Colorado called Mesa Verde, where the doorways are famously tiny, and which became one of the first World Heritage Sites in 1978.

Lina: Get ready for ancient mysteries, cliffside secrets and essential travel tips. Let's climb into this stone city right after the intro.

Lina: Welcome to World Heritage Rookies, the podcast where we explore UNESCO World Heritage Sites one episode at a time. We are Lina

Ralf: and Ralf, and we will travel alongside you to some of the most stunning sites our world has to offer.

Lina: Each week we dive into the history, fun facts and reasons why World Heritage Sites matter for humanity, sharing our own discoveries and travel tips along the way.

Ralf: So, let's dive in and learn about some World Heritage together.

Ralf: Welcome, everybody, to episode 12 of World Heritage Rookies. If it's the first time here with us, welcome. We're a podcast talking about World Heritage Sites. My name is Ralf, and I'm here with

Lina: Lina. And if you have heard our episodes before — even one or two — thank you so much, we really appreciate it, and welcome back. Actually, World Heritage number 12. And actually, I'm quite happy because this one — it's, the name is in Spanish, so I can actually pronounce it.

Ralf: Oh, that is good.

Lina: So, today, we are traveling to the southwest of Colorado to explore the Mesa Verde National Park.

Ralf: I know verde means green.

Lina: Yes, and I will explain what the other part means.

Ralf: Mesa is table, right? So, the green table?

Lina: Not specifically. Mesa. Well, that's part of what I was going to explain later, but why not now? So, mesa means also plateau. Mesa can be table or plateau. And this is the Green Plateau National Park.

Ralf: Okay, I'm sorry that you had to already spoil some of the information that you so due diligently researched for this episode.

Lina: Unfortunately, this is — the whole episode, it's wrong now. Thank you so much. Now we need to close.

Ralf: That will be a record for the shortest episode ever of us.

Lina: But no — as always, we start with the question, Ralf, what do you know about Mesa Verde National Park?

Ralf: So, I know that it translates into Spanish into the Green Plateau. I knew that, obviously, before this episode. No, but jokes aside.. Of course, yeah. Well, I knew it was a national park, and I think it has some actual cultural ruins in it. So, I think it's not just a World Heritage Site for its natural reasons. So, I think it might be actually having also cultural aspects, but not 100% sure about that.

Lina: So, basically, you don't know anything.

Ralf: But I just don't want to admit that.

Lina: Sometimes, honestly, it's the best.

Ralf: I will not admit to not know anything, but no, I don't know much about Mesa Verde National Park. Happy now?

Lina: Yes, thank you so much. So, well, into the topic. So, of course, the history first, as always. So, well, the story of Mesa Verde begins around 550 CE, or Common Era, when the ancestral people called the Ancestral Puebloans or Anasazi first made it into the region, and they pretty much did make this region their home. We unfortunately don't know a lot about them. There is not a lot of information about what happens between these 550 and around 750 CE — also for the Common Era — but what we know is that for over 7 centuries they grow, they flourish, they evolve from nomadic hunters to actually farmers, and they make this place — pretty much, their house, build in small family pit houses. Between 750 and 1150 CE, they pretty much enter what we call the Golden Age of their culture. The people began moving more and more into the pits of the plateau, of the different plateaus, and they actually started to build a little bit more things that could actually last. Many of the houses were now made in jacal, which means branches of mud and sandstone houses, which would last more than just a pit house made of different wood materials. During this period, they raised — they became community centers, actually large villages, and they served as social, economic, and religious activities inside the center of their communities. By the 12th century, they actually started to reach their architectural peak, building what we know as Mesa Verde National Park. This is basically a community made completely by stone, that pretty much — I mean, they took the canyon of the park, and they started to carve their houses in what we know today as cliff dwellings.

Ralf: So that means houses built into the stone itself.

Lina: Exactly, in the cliff.

Ralf: So, in lack of a better comparison, and because we've both been there, so a little bit like Petra in Jordan?

Lina: Yes, but in Mesa Verde and in these cliff dwellings, you can actually see — so they left the border of the cliff completely intact, and they built a little bit on there for security and keeping the community safe. But, yeah, you can see, like, similarities in at least the carving of the stone.

Ralf: Okay — interesting. Perhaps getting ahead a little bit, but — are, is this indigenous group, are they still around in the area, in the United States? Do you know this, by chance? Or have they disappeared?

Lina: Well, as many of the indigenous communities in the United States mostly disappeared, but there is a little remains. And there is still communities, indigenous communities, not the original community. I will talk a little bit about that later. But there are still indigenous communities today in the area of the site. By the mid of the 12th century, the population reached its peak. It's estimated that in these cliff dwellings, as I mentioned before, there's not one, there are several. They reach a population of around 19,500 people, between 9,500 people and 30,000, living in what we know a lot about — like, the whole park area. It is important to know that these cliff dwellings are actually several, what I mentioned before. They are mostly residential houses; they are not per se governmental buildings or other kind of infrastructure. And these Ancestral Puebloans, as I'm going to call them today, they spread all over Southwest USA, including Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, and Utah — oh, sorry, New Mexico. And, well, unfortunately, by the 13th century, they massively migrated out of this place, and they moved mostly to the south of what we call present-day New Mexico and Arizona.

Lina: Why — why did they move? That's a big question. And, of course, archaeologists have suggested many theories across the two centuries that this place had been found. But most of them agreed that it was through a 23-year drought when the soil was completely dry. And, of course, because the soil was completely dry, there was not food. There was also a social upheaval.

Ralf: That would have been also my question, if they know why the population there disappeared. And I find it very interesting. I have the feeling from my very limited experiences of mass exodus that droughts are very often the case. So, obviously, it makes sense when there's no food around, but that seems to be many of the places where people do not know why, or, like, where we do not really know why it disappeared. Droughts are very often the reason for that, or at least suspected.

Lina: Yeah, no, it isn't normal. I mean, not food. People get angry. People get really upset. People get really upset with their leaders. People leave. That's like a cycle.

Ralf: Or, unfortunately, people die.

Lina: Or people die. That's, like, how it happens normally. And the research can actually, you know, by analyzing the soil, they can actually see many centuries in the past and how was actually the season, the farming season in these places. And they know that there was a really long drought. So it is most likely this reason, especially in this specific period of time.

Ralf: Okay, so it is known there was a drought, but obviously you cannot prove that was the reason disappearing.

Lina: Not only the reason, but—

Ralf: — because of the timing, it is a really valid theory.

Lina: Exactly. And it's the one that is most accepted by the historians. Of course, this place pretty much disappeared in history. It was by the community, by the indigenous communities. There was, of course, stories about Mesa Verde, but, of course, no historical data between the 12th century and the 19th century.

Lina: This place was actually rediscovered in the late 1800s by local rangers — several actually, but the most famous ones were Richard Wetherill, I'm sorry if I mention it that wrong, and Charlie Mason — yes, another Charlie Mason — who famously stumbled upon the Cliff Palace, which is the most famous one, while searching for their stray cattle.

Lina: They lost their sheep, and they were like, "Oh, look — there it is, right there!"

Ralf: But it's also, like you said, it has mostly been forgotten for, like, 700 years, right?

Lina: Yeah, I mean, forgotten is in...quotation marks, exactly, because it has been — there were a lot of stories about these places, and actually many other people, researchers, and historians were looking for the place. So it was looked for a lot of time, and it was interesting to see that whoever actually found it was looking for their sheep.

Ralf: An accident, yeah.

Lina: An accident. Sometimes a really lucky accident, because... Bueno. So, of course, this is what I mentioned before. After the Pueblo people left to the southwest of the United States, other people — you know, the mountain tribes of Ute — inhabit this area, and they are still in this place. They hold sacred these sites, because in reality, they belong to their ancestors, because the Ute people had also connections with the Pueblo people. And, of course, because this place was so looked for by other explorers — I mean, I have some of the names, so, for instance, some specific explorers called Virginia McClurg pushed to, actually, when the place was discovered, to find federal protection. One of the reasons was, during the times between 1888, which was exactly the year of refinding, or rediscovering, this place, and 1906, there was a lot of looting. So, unfortunately, many of the pieces were completely lost forever, or, like, lost to the black market. And some of these explorers pushed to create the Mesa Verde National Park — that was in 1906, and was one of the first parks in this kind of prehistoric parks ever created in the United States. Who created it, in the end, was the government of Theodore Roosevelt. And, finally, we all know, by 1978, it was honored the title of the first UNESCO World Heritage Sites, one of the first UNESCO World Heritage Sites in the United States. The other one, also discussed by me, Yellowstone.

Ralf: Right, yeah — you had both UNESCO World Heritage Sites from the Unites States.

Lina: It was not coincidental —

Ralf: It was actually not — yeah.

Lina: Well, now we go a little bit into the fun facts. I already mentioned one — what "Mesa Verde" actually means — so thank you, Ralf. And, of course, it refers to the surroundings of the canyon, because the surroundings have a really interesting lush of grass, so they basically wanted to say, okay, this is a plateau and it's green. So, "Mesa Verde".

Ralf: You cannot argue about the descriptiveness of the name.

Lina: Exactly. And, of course, another interesting fact — yes, there were a lot of looters in a span of around 20 years, but, of course, many of the artifacts were recovered by archaeologists in the research after the place was considered a national park, and today there is a museum in the park with more than 500,000 archaeological artifacts. And the whole collection of cliff dwellings are around 600.

Ralf: That's a lot, yeah.

Lina: They are a lot. I will mention the most famous sites. So, there are four that are the biggest ones, and probably the ones that you can see when you look this up — through — on the internet. So, you will see the four most famous. The first one, and the one that actually led to the whole site being rediscovered, is Cliff Palace in Mesa Verde. This is the largest cliff dwelling, of course, and features around 150 different rooms. The thing is, like, the whole complex seems like a whole palace — that's why it's called the Cliff Palace. They don't know exactly what it was used for, but it's considered that the rooms were just for families. The second one is Long House, also in Mesa Verde. It features about 150 rooms, and then 21 different special structures, which, of course, they also don't know what they were for. The third one it's called Keet Seel, and it's actually in Arizona — it is a large, well-preserved settlement in the Tsegi Canyon. It could be the Tsegi Canyon? Tsegi Canyon? I'm not really sure how to pronounce it, but it's a little bit more to the south. And the final one, that is also really well known — that just means that not all the cliff dwellings are in Mesa Verde, you can find them in other states, because the territory is too big. It's Montezuma Castle, and it has a 5-story, 20-room structure, and it's in Arizona.

Ralf: So it's really spread out, these different complexes, yeah.

Lina: And all of them are national parks, or many of them are national parks or are protected by a certain level of, like, another association. Nevertheless, the only one that includes the UNESCO World Heritage title is Mesa Verde because it's the biggest.

Lina: Another really interesting fact: this complex, all of them, has really tiny doorways. So, many visitors — actually, it's a really common question — it's why the doors and the windows are so small. And it is important for you to remember that these are Aborigines people that were really short. So, the average man was between 5'4" or 162cm.

Ralf: That was the question — I mean, what would it be in centimeters, because my...

Lina: Between 162 and 165, and the average woman was around 5 foot, which means between 150 centimeters and 155 centimeters, so really short people. I'm kind of low-key offended, because I am that size, so I'm like, wait — well, I am the size of the man. I was quite average for a man's size, for the Pueblo people, but I was like, hey, what do you mean short? We are normal, but that's just something I thought while I was doing my research.

Ralf: Interesting fun fact, I think when you look at the average size of Colombians, you're actually taller than average, right?

Lina: Well, I'm average — I'm a good average, but yes, I'm a little bit taller than the average, but I was like, why I feel offended?

Ralf: You're not short, mi amor, you're not short.

Lina: I was like, ouch, and yes, I could go through the windows and doors — at least, well, through the doors for sure.

Ralf: That actually as a fun fact — I remember we were already at various sites where it was like, where I had to go like hunched over, or with my head scooped, and I'm not a tall person for German standards.

Lina: You are small.

Ralf: I'm actually below average for German standards, but you could walk, so, like, it is sometimes an advantage to be smaller, especially when you go to World Heritage Site, so you could take that as a consolation, mi amor.

Lina: Yeah, but I cannot reach the high cabinets in our own kitchen.

Ralf: There has to be something I'm good for in this relationship, so...

Lina: And, yeah, so — the living characteristics, just another fact — Cliff Palace, which has, what I mentioned before, around 150 rooms, could actually house approximately between 100 and 120 people. And it was the biggest, so, of course, the smallest will have the capacity of at least 20 people. So, yeah, this is some fun facts. Well, fun, I don't know, but facts for sure. And now we go to some stories and interesting things that had happened through history about Mesa Verde National Park.

Lina: One of the most fascinating things, and it is mentioned several times through my resources, actually, how they discovered what was the movement of the Pueblo people through the southwest of the United States. And how they discovered it was through turkeys. So, basically...

Ralf: We're talking about the bird, turkey?

Lina: Yep.

Ralf: Okay — Now I'm very curious.

Lina: So, archaeologists used ancient DNA from turkey bones to find that many of them actually crossed the Rio Grande River in New Mexico, and all of them came from Mesa Verde. They provided, like, that definitely proved that a large population of the Pueblo people actually took their birds and traveled with them through the south of the United States.

Ralf: Okay. So, just by the way, like — they took their turkeys with them, and that's how they know how... So...

Lina: The turkeys were coming from northern.

Ralf: From the north, yeah.

Lina: And the turkeys that you find in the south do not have the same DNA that the bones that they found in many of the sites of the Pueblo people, including the houses that they build in the south, in southern, further than Colorado. So, let's mention that they have several, and some of them are in Arizona, and some of them are also in New Mexico. So, of course, the bones that they found in these sites, many of them were birds that they were cooked, or they were pretty much dead by certain different circumstances, and they discovered their DNA didn't match the turkey population of the region.

Ralf: Okay — it's still very fascinating, what ways can help to explain history and the movement of, like, whole people, yeah.

Lina: I'm more amazed about how far science has gone through, and how far we can actually discover through the most random stuff.

Ralf: Yeah, sure. Let's examine the turkey bones, yeah.

Lina: The turkey bones, so, that's, that's really popular and it was mentioned everywhere, so I was like, okay, I do have to, I do have to include it. The second one is — well, the preservation of this park has been really difficult. One of them, for instance, when the park was founded, around 1910, a 23-year-old archaeologist, Jesse Nusbaum, took the task of actually saving Balcony House of complete destruction or collapse due to the weather and all the life conditions. Let's remember this is a cliff, so it's completely up to the nature — even though it's covered, rain drops go through the stone and so on — so it was really close to collapse, and what they did was to actually stabilize the different walls through — with metal and iron and different buckles that they pretty much put in stone. This, of course, was a logistical feat, because we are talking about tons of rocks, equipment up the cliff — because, of course, these are cliffs, so they needed ropes, and they needed pulleys, and they had to invent technology to actually save this place. So it is one of the studies that you can find on different historical websites. And what is interesting, and I will come back a little bit to the topic, is that these iron structures are a big debate today, because, of course, you can imagine, they are not pretty, they clash a lot with a completely stone-made structure, but at the same time, they have survived for more than 100 years now.

Ralf: It reminds me a little bit of what we had in a discussion of the Churches of Lalibela, where it was the same thing — that you would have now iron structures, or like constructions around the churches, because otherwise they would be, yeah, in danger of collapsing, and this is then, again, what I think is very often the balance when it comes to conserving sites, like — okay, how do you, on the one hand, ensure that it's not obstructing everything too much, but also, well, you sometimes have to deal with the fact that they might not be pretty, but they're making sure that the original buildings are still standing.

Lina: Yes, of course, but in the end of the day, we are talking about technology that was put there many years ago. Now the question would be, does the park have enough resources to make it better, to use new technology, to have another mechanism? This is maybe the question. Also, if it's working, maybe visually speaking is not the best, but touching it again will even affect more. So this kind of question has to be taken into account when, of course, people is criticizing, because, of course, this saved a completely huge structure 100 years ago, so maybe it's the balance between what works and how pretty it looks. But yeah, so basically a little bit of information and stories about the site.

Lina: And now, as always, we enter into the question: Ralf, how many criteria do you think are important, or were important, for UNESCO to make it a World Heritage Site?

Ralf: My initial thought was that it would be a natural World Heritage, but, I mean, now since everything you told me about was focused on the cultural aspect, I think, actually, I will have to restate it, and I think it will fulfill one cultural criteria.

Lina: That's true, that's the first time that actually you are doing the guess right.

Ralf: I'm not sure if it's the first time, but, like, for sure you're better at these guesses than me.

Lina: It is the first time. I remember. I think so. No, I actually don't remember. But, yes, it's actually criteria number three, cultural testimony. Mesa Verde is a unique example of cultural civilization, even whether it still exists or not. And unfortunately, many of the people don't exist anymore. Of course it represents a graphic representation, or, like, an architectural representation, of the Pueblan people and the American culture in the southwest before the colonial time. So, yeah, this is why it is a World Heritage Site.

Lina: Nevertheless, of course, we already talk about the conservation efforts that, of course, are still today a huge discussion. We know these are structures made of stone and the erosion is today threatening to destroy all the cliffs. Climate change is also one of the worst

Ralf: factors

Lina: factors to put — exactly. Of course, unfortunately, the park has gone through several fires, and for the most part, between 2000 and 2003, more than 24.000 acres of wildlife were completely burned. Unfortunately, also, what's threatened by these fires is not just the infrastructure — which is the infrastructure of the cliffs, which is more in danger — but the loss of trees and endangered species. One of them being the Chapin Mesa milkvetch, which is a rare plant found only in this part, and researchers are struggling to keep it alive because it's in danger, due to the fires. And, of course, other issues with air and water — drops of water are pretty much depleting the art — in Mesa Verde you can find a lot of painted walls made by the Pueblo people symbolizing their culture and tradition, and these walls are in danger to disappear as well. Of course, there are efforts to provide, like, a saving, but this is pretty much why — the second reason, like — the second discussion has been around.

Lina: So we know that Mesa Verde is actually an Aboriginal site, and many local tribes do not agree on how national — American national parks — handle the conservation efforts. So, as we — as we maybe know, or maybe I didn't mention it so far — but for many of the local tribes, Mesa Verde is a place of spiritual significance. There is, I read, around 26 different associated tribes to the sites, and the relation between these groups and the federal government has always been a tricky thing to do. One of the biggest conflicts occurred, actually, years after the park was established. As I mentioned, there were already several number of tribes there, and to secure the largest ruins, the U.S. government pressured the Ute tribe, which was the biggest tribe in the site, to move, and to give away around 10,000 acres for the park. Unfortunately, they were promised to be moved somewhere else, and decades later, they gave these tribes a territory that initially were already belonging to them. So, it was more, pretty much a trick. And this happened around 1920, so, like, a century ago, but, of course, this has remained the biggest controversy of the site. Another controversy is that during the 20s and the 30s, when the park opened, there were a lot of Indian ceremonies performed to tourists, depicting the Navajo tribe, which is the most famous American tribe in the United States, which was not the tribe that was in the site.

Ralf: Yeah, yeah, I was also — I mean, like, they are not associated with the site by itself.

Lina: No, exactly, and, of course, a lot of tribes around Mesa Verde were completely upset, because they were the wrong Indians, doing the wrong dance, the wrong ceremonies, just to, pretty much, entertain the tourists. Of course, they were performing racist misconceptions of Aborigines people in the United States, as well. Of course, this disappeared after some decades, but it's still — it was still part of the things that the tribes were not agreeing with, of what the government was doing. The third thing that did happen, and it was also a really big controversy, is that the first Park Museum featured some dioramas created in 1930 that portray the Ancestral Puebloan life, and of course they were misinterpretations of what they actually were and what was their traditions. Many of them pictured these dioramas as racist, disrespectful, and, of course, they protested for a lot of time until the museum permanently retired this exhibition a couple decades afterwards. So, yeah, this is some of the biggest controversies. And now the big question.

Lina: The thing that makes the most amount, like, the most, or the most recurring question between the tribes and the government is if this site should exist at all. And the reason is, the tribes and the Aboriginal people believe that the soil should come back to their normal cycle. If this site is supposed to disappear by the nature, by what, yeah, comes naturally, it should be like that. Why did the government say, like, no, we need to save it because it's a historical place and we need to conserve our history. So, the question here that I found most interesting is, one side, where the people that actually, the ancestors of that people say, like, no, it should not be conserved anymore. Let it back, let it back to the stone, if that's the case, or the historical path. So, the question is, preserve, or let go? What do you think, Ralf?

Ralf: That's a really hard question, because it's more translating into, well, how okay or ethically is it to go against the will of the people who have the most claim to it. I think I'm going to be in a bit of controversy in the next statement. So, I would go towards preserving for the main reason that I think you should try to preserve as much historical topics as possible. While, obviously, in my opinion, you need to, you should always listen to the opinion and the wishes of the indigenous populations that have the most claim to it. In this sense, I would probably go with the way I think, especially because of its historical importance and making sure that what is preserved of it, it should actually try to be preserved. Because, in my opinion, it's any kind of history that you lose, be it good or bad, or in this case, it's neither one of them. But any kind of history you lose means a loss of knowledge for humanity, and it will prevent us from, yeah, from learning from the past. So, I'm in general against letting something disappear. I think everything in history should try to be preserved. So, for me, I would advocate more towards preservation as much as it conflicts me to say that you would have to disrespect the wishes of the indigenous people who have the most association with it.

Lina: Well, I think that it's true, but, I mean, at the same time, and I think that it's a really valid reason, the Pueblo people, actually the remainings of the original Pueblo, have this tradition that they say that everything should allow to return to earth naturally. It's true. This is true, especially when the time has passed. This was never supposed for, in their view, there was never supposed to be a historical place. It was just houses where they live. At the same time, I understand your point. So, it is really an interesting fact, and it's an interesting question that many people — that's one of the discussions that I found in Reddit. Funny thing, sometimes Reddit has good stuff, and a lot of people was like, "Yeah, but you cannot go against the tradition of the people that actually build the place." So, it is a really hard question, right? I found it so interesting, and I was like, I do not know also the answer. I would not point myself through any of the both sides, you probably had more okay with preserve, but at the same time, it's like, okay, if I build a house, and that house becomes historical in 100 years, and you come back to me and say, like, "Oye, what do you want to do with the house?" It's my right, right? So, to preserve, to become a hotel, to become something else. I mean, it is my house, you know what I mean? So I was thinking like, in my perspective — who has the last word? And unfortunately, in this case, yes, the government, even though, and I have to admit, I found a lot of efforts from National Park Service of Mesa Verde to get to a middle ground. So they are trying to create a co-management between the different tribes and the park managers. Also kind of pushing for something called Land Back, which is a movement that tries to give the land back to the tribe entirely, though the park would maintain this co-administration. So there are efforts to get to middle ground, but at the same time, who owns the property, you know, like?

Ralf: Yeah, I know, and you're absolutely right. So I think it's important that you hear both sides, so it's good that there is, I don't know, like, my very naive first approach is like, okay, perhaps you could find a compromise in saying, like, you know what, we are, we're gonna focus on conserving only certain parts of it anymore. So, and like, you let some of the complex be claimed again by nature, and in this way respect the wishes of the indigenous community, and some other parts are agreed to be upon preserved, to ensure memory for the coming generations. So that could, I don't know, from my very naive point of view, the whole truth is gonna be a lot more complicated, but that will be my first thought. Okay, perhaps there could be a way of compromise. But I think in the end I stand with my point. I believe you should try to conserve as much as possible from a historical point of view. This very often can lead to conflict. I mean, even in our cultures and societies, you have this on a very more small scale, where you have, like, historically protected houses, and that means that people that own it, they cannot do certain changes they cannot do, and this is also limiting, in a way, your rights as an owner of it. But there is the — in my opinion, the importance for preservation and ensuring that history continues to live on is something that might outweigh this. And here also, when you look at the achievement and the importance it has, and also my thought is, perhaps, in a few decades or centuries, it might then also, the viewpoint change, perhaps, and actually there might then be more of the indigenous population that are then saying, well, we are proud of this achievement of our ancestors, and we know it's important, because I think also what you have to consider, once it disappears, it disappears for good. You will not be able ever to rebuild it. So, how do you know if now the decision would be made to make it disappear? How do we know there is no regret for that? And having said, like, in a few decades, hey, we wish we could have preserved this. So, I'm always very, very careful when it comes to the decision to let something just vanish into history.

Lina: That's true, that's true. And it's, again, a question that is not only applicable for Mesa Verde National Park, but for many places. What is the difference between private property and communal property? What, who takes the rights, the government, the people that inherit these communities? I mean, and this happens a lot around the world. And in this case, yeah, for sure. I mean, they are going to keep maintaining the park. I mean, it is one of the most visited places in Colorado. So, it is definitely something that also attracts tourism and definitely resources to the state. But at the same time, it is important to hear. And I think that's what you say, like, common ground should be reached. And this is the only way in the end of the day because everybody has a different point of view. But yeah, this is the discussion around Mesa Verde National Park. Really interesting and really interesting to see how it evolves in the future. So, maybe we can even bring some afterwards episode. I don't know, something like that. We can, in a couple of years, we can go back and say, hey, what had happened with these discussions that had been going on?

Ralf: We're really optimistic about the future of this, assuming it will last for a couple of years. So, if you enjoyed this episode, please also tune in for future episodes.

Lina: Yes, and thumbs up. I don't know if we can thumbs up.

Ralf: Well, you can give us an indication that you like it, yeah.

Lina: So, I guess that this is a happier transition into our travel tips. Because otherwise, it would be a little bit like we are touching too sensitive topics, but well, now the fun part — the fun part is actually visiting the park. Always, the first thing you need to plan ahead. Of course, you can only enter major sites like Cliff Palace, Balcony House and Long House with ranger-guided tours, because it is a really difficult terrain. So, please remember that this is in cliffs. It is important to book your tickets in advance, especially through the summer season, which has high demand, and many of the things, or many, for instance, the guide needs to be reserved in advance, so please go to the park website at recreation.gov to find all the information on how and when to get the tickets for the reservation.

Ralf: We're gonna, again, you'll find the necessary resources in the show notes of the podcast, so you can also get there if you need to have more support.

Lina: Exactly, so, of course, as I mentioned before, it is a difficult terrain and be prepared for heights. Tours are physically demanding, which means are not 100 percent fit for handicapped people. Please read about these conditions before. There is certain parts of the park that you can actually go when, for instance, you're in a wheelchair, but please be aware that you're not all gonna be able to see all the park. For instance, visiting Balcony House requires climbing a 30-foot ladder and crawling down through a narrow tunnel. So, to enter, to actually be in the site, you need to pretty much kind of like do a hiking down, and it's important for you to be aware of that. The Cliff Palace involves around a 45-minute trek that includes climbing four ladders and navigating uneven terrains of around 30 meters in elevation. So, they're gonna go up and down a lot, and the terrain is not suited for people that cannot move easily. Of course, the park can, I mean, the cliff can be seen from far away, and that's what many of the tourists that have some type of mobility issues choose. So, also, this information on how to see the cliffs in front of the cliffs can be found in recreation.gov. And, know your limits. This is not your average walk in the park, so please be pretty aware of what can or can you not do. Use comfortable shoes and comfortable clothes. Of course, check the season, while the park has beautiful viewpoints all around the year, so you can actually see the cliffs from far away, all year round. The primary season is between May and October, because of the climbing situation, because the cliffs needs to be certain, they need to be dry, in order to be able to go down and up. During the winter, you can definitely visit, but be aware that many of the roads are closed. And the cliffs dwelling themselves are closed through the heavy snow. Once again, you can see them from far away, but you will not be able to enter, actually, the structures.

Lina: As I mentioned before, during the episode, the park has a museum, and you cannot miss it. It's called the Chapin Mesa Archaeological Museum, which was one of the first museums in the whole National Park Service. So, it's one state of the art museum. It has around three million objects of different tribes population in the United States, and apparently, it's one of the best museums to understand the Aborigines history of the United States. So, it's really highly recommended.

Ralf: So, not just focused on the area of Mesa Verde, but overall, the indigenous cultures and histories in the United States.

Lina: Yeah, yeah — of course. So, it is, it has, of course, around what I mentioned before, big part of the whole museum, it's specifically about the Pueblo people, and the Mesa Verde National Park history. But, of course, it brought also many of the artifacts around the United States.

Lina: Regarding food and bed, you can stay in the park. There are two places to stay. The first one is the Far View Lodge, which is open, it's a hotel open between April and late October. But, if you are up to a little more, a little bit more of a rustic experience, you can also camp in the Morefield Campground, which are open from mid of May to mid October. Please have in mind that I'm just basically saying that you cannot actually stay during the winter time. There are some vehicle restrictions, especially because of the roads in Mesa Verde are steep and winding, so you only can drive with a trailer and a large RV until the Morefield Campground. So you can bring your camp until the campground, but afterwards you will have to use of the other transportation methods offered by the park. You cannot bring your RV until the site, just because, of course, for conservation. Additionally, the road has restricted limits regarding size and weight of these vehicles. So vehicles cannot be over 8,000 pounds or be bigger than 7 meters long. So for instance, tours with larger buses cannot enter the site, so other methods have to be provided by your tour guide. And it is important to mention as well that please do not spend all your time in the park in the ladders or visiting the site. Remember that the park has around 20 miles of hiking and trails that also allow you to see the cliffs from a different distance and a different point of view. So maybe check that out as well. Yeah, that's pretty much the tips that I found. They are pretty standard for any other national park or any other park around the world. But most importantly, these are cliffs and this is important, you remember, you have to climb down and climb up. And that's pretty much from my side.

Ralf: Well, pretty interesting and I have to admit not what I had in mind in the beginning. When I thought, okay, Mesa Verde National Park, like I mentioned, I imagined a natural park especially for its natural beauty, which is also there, as you mentioned, but the highlight is the culture part.

Lina: Yes, the structures.

Ralf: Yeah. I think it's a bit of the time for the verdict, right? And this time, like, I think I have to decide if I would put it into our wish list or not. If I remember — yeah.

Lina: I guess, it's time to decide. Will you put it in your top list for the next five years?

Ralf: That's a really difficult question. So, I mean, I'm gonna ignore the fact that I unfortunately do not see us traveling to the United States for a while because of various reasons. I have to admit, I would love to see it because I'm super interested in any kind of architecture made in stone by itself. So, I mentioned before, I really was blown away by Petra and what is done there. I mentioned in an episode before, like with the Rock-Hewn Churches of Lalibela, that this is something I'm super interested in. So, anything built in the stone by itself is super fascinating for me. So, but still, I would probably go with no. Because, the way you described it, I do not think, with the way how you experience, like with the climbing and everything else, and knowing some of our limitations when it comes to like steep hikes and climbing, I do not think we could experience as properly enough. So, while I would be super interested and curious about it, I would say no, for the very simple reason, I do not think we could explore it in the way that it should probably best be explored. You look disappointed.

Lina: I can. I can explore.

Ralf: Okay, good for you now, but

Lina: I was like, wait a minute. Why are you talking in "we"? We are not "we". We are —

Ralf: So you are the one who's going to be doing the hiking part, and I'm the one—

Lina: Exactly — you're the one who's away, yeah — exactly. You are with the group in front of the cliff.

Ralf: But no, I'm not the biggest hiker. So the way you describe it to me like, you know your limits and know your limitations. I think...

Lina: Also, it is important to mention that, of course, I mean, probably you can, if not, it is more for people that actually really have highly mobility issues... and one of them is like, being able to walk. So, it is important also to know that if you, for instance, have fear of heights, it could be a problem. And I think that this, it's where I am like, yeah, maybe you are not suitable for that. You are going to be climbing down, and you are going to be with security things, of course, and it's, it's a safe place. It's not like, okay, now hike, now climb down a hill. No, of course not. But, it is important also, what I said, know your limits in all instances. Not only if you are able, or capable to walk or not, but also if you have fear of heights, or you are not willing to go down a ladder. Well, probably this is not, this is not for you.

Ralf: Yeah, true. But, it definitely sounds like an amazing experience. So

Lina: And it's beautiful, I mean, I don't know if you've seen it in the photos, but it's beautiful.

Ralf: I will check it out afterwards, and as usual I think we will show some nice pictures on the companion post to this episode you will find on our Instagram, @worldheritagerookies, but it is definitely not what I expected about it.

Lina: That's great, because that's exactly what we, I mean, I didn't expect it what we talked last time in our episode 11, so please go and check it out, it's a really interesting conversation, and that's it.

Ralf: And I think this is also in a way like a bit of a closing moment, because with this episode we're actually finishing our first, I would say like segment or selection of World Heritage Sites, so I guess most of you have realized by now that obviously we were talking now in the last, or like in this 12 episodes about the first 12 World Heritage Sites that were inscribed in the year 1978, and we sort of made a decision, or like a choice that, you know what, we could of course continue chronologically, because as you know, UNESCO keeps on inscribing World Heritage Sites every year, but we thought, you know what, let's keep sort of this structure of 12 sites, but let's try to come up with a bit of a twist, so what we will try to do is that we will present you then always like a selection of 12 sites that have something that connects them, perhaps you can then figure out during the episodes what is going to be the unifying criteria or topics that we selected, and yeah, so we're going to start from the next episode, a new selection of 12 sites that are connected somehow,

Lina: and it's going to be your opportunity to actually try to discover what it is, so if you have an idea, even from the first episode of this second round, let us know @worldheritagerookies, or also in the description down below.

Ralf: Yeah, you can let us know on various ways, but, so I think it's going to be interesting to also journey around with you to figure out what we're going to talk about, so I'm going to start our next episode also for this new segment, and as a little spoiler is, so we're going to travel back to Europe, and it's actually going to be the first World Heritage Site that we talk about from the United Kingdom in the next,

Lina: Ooh, new country,

Ralf: new country, like the first time we're discussing a United Kingdom World Heritage Site, and I can also just again say it fits in the theme of the last ones, like, it is surprisingly, like, you did not expect to have that much debate and history of the site, I can spoil it already, so I hope that you're looking as forward to it as I am.

Lina: I am, and thank you so much to everybody for listening to us, I know sometimes we talk too much, so I really appreciate for the ones who still listen to us, and well, see you next week. Goodbye!

Ralf: Goodbye!