Some of the favorite trips the someone and I have taken together involve camping in a remote spot. Spots that are beautiful and often are steeped in the history and culture of the past.
The Colorado Plateau is full of such areas.
Even a straight up-backcountry trip such as ones in Escalante National Monument go through these ancient areas.
For anyone appreciates history, culture, isolation and exquisite beauty, it is all a wonderful mix.
Synthesizing all this information can be daunting for a non-academic such as myself.
Luckily, there is a fantastic website maintained by a former Chaco volunteer and later employee: Gambler’s House.
Though focused on the Chacoan world, the website discusses issues that are important in ancient Pueblo culture in general.
The topics covered include pottery, trade, new discoveries, archeoastronomy, religious ceremonies, influences of other cultures and many, many, many more interesting and well written articles.
The tone of the articles can be best described as scholarly yet approachable. Perhaps along the lines of National Geographic (well, perhaps as it used to be.. 🙂 ).
A person could spend hours upon hours reading one interesting article after another.
The first article on Pueblo Bonito is perhaps a good introduction to the overall site as any. The article covers topics that are of nterest to anyone who enjoys southwest archaeology
Overall, I find Gambler’s House to be an excellent, informative and enjoyable resource I can picture myself referring to a lot in the coming months and possibly years.
Enjoy the site…and be prepared to get go deep into the rabbit hole of something very interesting!