We arrived at Canyon de Chelly on Monday. We drove along the South Rim Trail, stopping at every overlook. Canyon de Chelly is quiet. It is sacred to the Navajo and the silence provides a spiritual experience. It overwhelms you!
Archeological evidence shows that people have lived in Canyon de Chelly for nearly 5,000 years, longer than anyone has lived uninterrupted on the Colorado Plateau. The first residents built no permanent homes, but remains of their campsites and images etched or painted on canyon walls tell their stories. Later, people built household compounds, storage facilities, and ceremonial complexes high on ledges on the canyon walls. They lived in small groups, hunted game, grew corn and beans, and created paintings on the walls that surrounded them. Ancestral Puebloan people, the Anasazi, followed. They built multi-storied villages and kivas that dot the canyon alcoves.
About 700 years ago most people moved away, but a few remained in the canyons. Later, migrating Hopi Indians and other tribes spent summers in the canyon. At the end of a long journey, the Navajo arrived about 300 years ago, to build homes and add their own designs to the canyon walls. In 1863, Kit Carson began a brutal campaign against the Navajo. In the winter of 1864, Carson's troops entered the eastern end of Canyon de Chelly and pushed the Navajo toward the canyon mouth. Resistence proved futile and most Navajo were captured or killed. Carson's forces returned in the spring to complete their campaign and destroyed the remaining hogans and orchards, and killed the sheep. Forced to march over 300 miles, called the Long Walk, to Fort Sumner in New Mexico territory, scores of Navajo perished from thirst, hunger, and fatigue. In 1868, the Navajo were allowed to return home to rebuild their lives. Practices taken from Spanish and Mexican traders provided a model for the trading posts that built up in Navajo country.
Canyon de Chelly (pronounced SHAY) is inhabited by the Navajo today. It is the epicenter of Navajo culture. The White House Ruin Trail is the only place where visitors may enter the canyon without a permit or a guide. The Trail is 2.5 miles roundtrip. Needless to say, we were on it! White House Ruin was built by ancestral Puebloan people and occupied about 1,000 years ago. It is named for the long wall in the upper dwelling that is covered with white plaster.
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| White House Ruin from overlook |
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| White House Ruin |
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| White House Ruin from Canyon floor | | | |
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| Petroglyph at White House Ruin |
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| Mary, Lulu, Papa at the Spider Rock Overlook |
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| Spider Rock |
