Canyons of the Ancients and Hovenweep National Monument

Canyon of the Ancients National Monument

The Canyons of the Ancients National Monument (CANM), run by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) covers over 170,000 acres of high desert in the southwest corner of Colorado.

The Anasazi Heritage Center, a very modern visitor center and museum, is in Dolores, Colorado.

The Visitor Center has elaborate gardens surrounding it.

Lowrey Pueblo at CANM 1060-1170 AD

Thousands of archeological sites have been identified in CANM. We chose to visit the Lowry Pueblo because it was easy to access (about 3 miles on gravel) and well developed.

Lowry Pueblo was named after an early 20th century homesteader.

Peek a Boo

The Great Kiva, 47 feet in diameter, is the largest kiva found in the area. It is believed that the masonary work in the floor of the kiva represents the different seasons, summer and winter.

We had our picnic lunch at Lowry Pueblo and proceeded on to Hovenweep.

Hovenweep National Monument

Our loop tour through Canyons of the Ancients included going through the southeast corner of Utah into Hovenweep National Monument.

Rim Trail Loop, a one-and-a-half-mile trail begins behind the Visitor Center.

Twin towers, one of many ruins along the Rim Trail, originally had sixteen rooms and was built above the bedrock on the canyon rim.

Holly Unit

There are five outlying units beyond the Visitor Center, all accessed via unimproved dirt roads. We had time to visit three of these.

The roads start out as smooth dirt and then become large rocks. We were glad for our 4 X 4 high clearance Ranger.

Holly was built at the head of Keeley Canyon.

Holly Tower perched on a tall boulder in the canyon, was apparently built from the inside, one floor at a time.

Tilted Tower was built atop a large sandstone boulder that shifted sometime after 1300 AD. The upper stories tumbled into the canyon.

Horseshoe & Hackberry Unit

Kurt took an unofficial side trail to overlook the canyon and found himself in a field of boulders.

It is believed this was an observation or signaling tower.

The tower overlooks Hackberry Canyon.

The two towers stand on the rim at both sides of the cliff dwellings below.

During our tour of the outlying units, we did not encounter another visitor. 

Cajon Unit

Cajon Canyon is small and the buildings here are clustered together with a panoramic view of the plains below.

More dwellings exist below the canyon rim close to the spring.

These reddish-brown nodules in the sandstone are naturally occurring, hard masses of iron oxide and calcium carbonate that were deposited as mineral water moved through the sandstone. They are called concretions. We saw many examples of these, some even looked like old iron pipes and others appeared solid.