Canyon of the Ancients National Monument

Author's Comments

The first time I drove into Canyon of the Ancients I missed the turn twice. There is no grand entrance, no visitor center looming at the gateway, no signage that promises wonder. Just a gravel road peeling off the highway near Cortez and a landscape that does not announce itself. That is precisely the point. What you find here, if you are patient and willing to walk, is something close to time travel. Six thousand archaeological sites are scattered across this monument. Pueblos. Towers. Kivas. Most of them unmarked. The Sand Canyon trail in late October is where I tend to begin, when the cottonwoods at the canyon mouth have gone gold and the sagebrush smells stronger after a cold night. The trail moves you slowly into shallow sandstone country, and the ruins appear the way wildlife appears, only after you have stopped looking for them. Golden hour here does something specific. The sandstone goes peach, then rust, then a deeper red as the sun drops, and the small stone walls left by the Ancestral Puebloans catch that light in a way that makes them seem briefly inhabited again. I have made some of my quietest photographs in this country. Wide frames of mesa and shadow. Tight details of doorways smaller than my shoulders. A practical word. The roads turn to slick clay when they get wet, and you will not drive out until they dry. Check the forecast. Bring more water than you think. Tell someone where you went. This is not a place that gives itself easily, and that is the gift of it.

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