8:42 a.m.
When we arrived at Aztec Ruins National Monument we found that it was in a very pleasant part of town, with tall cottonwoods mixed with pinyons and juniper. Everything seemed refreshing and green.

We stopped in the Visitor Center and talked with the Ranger for a short while, bought a few books and a trail guide, looked around in the museum, then walked outside to explore the ruins. The interesting thing about this site is that you can enter several of the small rooms, underneath the main part of the structure, and see what it was like when it was occupied. It seems like a small site, compared to those at Chaco Canyon and Mesa Verde, but that's misleading because many of the ruins have not been excavated, or have been backfilled to protect them.

There are some interesting stone features in the construction of the outside walls. The builders had used a darker stone to make a horizontal pattern among the layers. However, according to archaeologists, all of the exterior surfaces were covered with a layer of adobe, so the fine workmanship would have been hidden.

We visited the site of the unusual three walled kiva, and then walked through the courtyard to explore the reconstructed great kiva (see the photo above) that is the prominent feature at this location. Walking into that structure is like entering a scene from an Indiana Jones movie. Everything is so large and unexpected. And the colors are an interesting treat, since we are used to seeing only the bare stones and the buffs and grays of the natural rock.

10:05 a.m.
We finished up our visit to this location and headed back through Farmington toward the Waterflow Archaeological Site and the town of Shiprock.