Wednesday, October 22, 2008

US Trip part 5a Salmon ruins

The view from the balcony of my brothers townhouse
nice place to have coffee



We drove down to Farmington NM
Jepedo had some business to take care of
So we fired up the big diesel, and off we go
It was really boring, so I sat in the truck with the aircon on
listening to some great Mexican accordion music

On the way back we stopped in at the "Salmon Ruins"
It is named for the Salmon family who lived here and protected the ruins
In 1970 they were excavated
These ruins of the date from 1088 AD
More details here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salmon_Ruins

Before we started the tour brodinski
decides to play with some cacti





For the rest of the day he was pulling the spines from his hand
it was quite amusing



Inside the center there is quite a number of artifacts from the site
plus, a history of natives from the area
What I found most interesting was the information on
the Navajo code talkers
During WWII Japanese intelligence broke every Allied military code
In may of 1942 a code was created using the unwritten Navajo language
Navajo code talkers, used their native tongue
to transmit secret military information



Looking south toward Shiprock NM
You can see it in the distance



The Salmon homestead



The walls are slanted in a the base
this is to keep the sun off of them
keeping the interior cooler



This is were they kept their children





Jepedo



The ruins





I was impressed with their stone craft









An ancient jacuzzi with one big ass jet





Jepedo trying to summon
the spirit of the
"Great Chile"



Native tools



In the center
there is a small square hole
it is the door to the under world

That is were all eternally happy people
end up





A red rock



Wildlife







Some of the displays around the site







early graffiti

damn kids





Yes they do serve Chihuahuas
they just call it chicken

"Spicy"



Mmmm Chihuahua



On the way back to Durango we passed this lovely fixeruper

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