Bandelier NP and Los Alamos

Right now we are in Durango, Colorado, ready to see the Mesa Verde National Park.

The two days before we visited Bandelier National Park and the town that never was: Los Alamos.

At Bandelier we visited the evidence of the Ancestral Pueblo people that can be found in the whole South West. There is no written history about those people. All we know now is by the evidence they left in their dwellings, artifacts, and petroglyphs. It is believed that the ancient culture is continuing in the culture of the modern pueblos in the South West. Bandelier hosts a few cliff dwellings and Tyuonyi Pueblo. That "big house" had 400 rooms but only 100 people lived there. Many of the rooms were used mostly for storage of food and pens for turkeys.

James was not so fond of all the ladders we had to climb up and later down at the Alcove House. He later said the he had to face dead when he was climbing the ladders. I thought that it was not so bad. The altitude was more that got me there. At more then 2200 m one can be short of breath very easy.

We camped at the campground in Bandelier after we had done a bit of scienic byway over the wooded mountains on NM-4. The next day we visited Los Alamos. During the second world war the town did not even exist, because the team of Robert Oppenheimer developed the first atomic bomb there. Even today the Los Alomos Laboratoreis still exist and most of the land around Los Alamos is off limits for the public. Of course we visited the science museum there where we learned everything about the bomb.

On our way to Durango, Colorado I got sick. I think it was a combination of food poisoning from the burger we in Los Alamos and the altitude. Anyway James took all responsibility and checked us in into a very nice Super 8. Thank you my wonderful man, for what you did to me!

After a good rest I feel ready now to face more adventures.