Mesa Verde and Durango, Colorado

After Andrew's night battling food poisoning, we decided to take it easy today. We visited Mesa Verde as planned, but we mostly did the "driving tour," stopping off here and there to look over the cliffs and see the ancient dwellings of the Pueblo peoples nestled in the cliff side. Quite, quite amazing! We did one short walk to visit one of the cliff dwellings, the "Spruce Tree House," which was really interesting to see up close:



We then went on to Durango, Colorado, which was exciting for me since I used to go there as a child when I'd live with my dad in the summers (and an occasional winter). It is a beautiful little city in the mountains of Southwestern Colorado, and has become quite the upscale tourist destination. My childhood memories mostly involved visiting the John Deere (tractor) store and getting ice cream at Swensons by the train station. Well, I was able to confirm that the John Deere store is still there (although it looked a bit different from my memories), but no sign of Swensons. Andrew and I found a small motel to stay at, which turned out to be a bit of a dive. Andrew figured out that our room was actually tilting. He'd take a cylinder (can of shaving cream) and put it on various surfaces in the room, it would quickly roll towards one side of the room! Well, despite our tilting, divey little motel, we had a fun time in Durango. We went out for a nice walk by the river, and a very tasty dinner in the downtown area.