To Canyon de Chelly

Sunday, 9/9

We left early to drive even further east (that will be a theme of almost every day to come, with a few minor exceptions) and onto "The Res".  It's actually a Navaho-Hopi-Navaho reservation (seen from west to east) and although the Hopi, in solidarity with the rest of Arizona, do not observe daylight savings time, the Navaho nation DOES observe DST.  So that means that one can do a lot of changing of watch time back and forth, traveling through the state.  Fortunately for Nils it meant that he could say he stayed up til 7pm tonight (I wish that I was kidding here).

But I'm getting ahead of myself.   First we stopped for gas in Chinle and  while Nils was inside paying,  I was hustled by a poor Navaho who saw our fancy truck and RV and kayaks and figured I'd be good for a few bucks.  He said that we could go boating in the canyon (not true!) and told me in his broken English how he was, at one time,  a sheep-herder responsible for 1000 sheep all by himself.  And then he asked me for some money.  I figured that in the name of Good Juju Enhancement, I'd give him $5.  He said to me, after noting that I also had a $20 in my roll of cash that "Twenty would be OK too!"  I replied that twenty would NOT be OK with me, gave him $5 and watched him run across the street to the little shopping mall.  He did say thank-you, at least.   Then we were off to find a camping site.     After we settled into the Cottonwood Campground (just inside the Canyon de Chelly National Monument) we drove the North rim of Canyon del Muerte and got out at three different Viewpoints.   Beautiful narrow green valley with fams, meandering rier and lots of cottonwood trees, surrounded by majestic red cliffs.

Canyon del Muerte (yes, that means death.  The drop-off is pretty sheer)

Remains of an ancient Anasazi village nestled at the bottom of the canyon

Here's the long view--same ancient ruins down left

 There were ruins of old Hopi Villages---1000 years old in some cases.  And I found a bunch of very twisted trees.  Here's just one picture (I took many more, believe me):

The big branch coming off to the left actually twisted over onto itself.

On the north side of the road along the canyon we passed many houses, ranches, schools, even a cemetery...it was only when we got very close to the canyon by driving on little access roads to the lookout points, that we were on National Monument land and no longer on the Reservation.   It's obvious that these people are getting by but do not have much money.  For the first time in all our travels, there were signs at the campgrounds warning us to keep all valuables locked up due to frequent robberies in the area.  Not really a surprise given the level of poverty around here.