We visited Mesa Verde, these are some of the pics we took.   We mainly are presenting pics of the Cliff Palace and the Balcony House.   These are a very different type of cliff dwellers from Bandelier.   The folks at Mesa Verde built homes in the natural caves in the edge of the mesa and some simple, earlier dwelllings on top of the mesa.  

Looking East toward the Jan Juan mountains, just above the mesa top.

The Cliff Palace.

In the Cliff Palace, looking north.

Again looking North panning a little to the West.

One of the tower structures showing some of the construction at the very top of the cave.

The North end of the Cliff Palace showing more towers and some of the lower construction.

A little wider view of the ruin from the North end.

To enter the Balcony House you must climb a 26 foot tall ladder.   Here we can see folks climbing the ladder up into Balcony House, from almost at the canyon floor.

Some of the construction in Balcony House.

More of the buildings, this one shows the "balcony" from which this ruin got it's name.

The entire "balcony".   You can see what kind of masons they were.   Remember, these have been restored but using available rocks and the same construction techniques as the original builders.

From the other end of the "balcony".

Kivas in Balcony House.   These were originally covered and just appeared as a flat roof in a stone circle, with a square hole and a ladder going down to the bottom.   You can just see a rectangular "buttress" on the far wall inside the kive, this was one of several the supported the roof.   Kivas were built by each clan and were used as ceremonial meeting places.

Heres how you get out of Balcony House.   After crawling through a very tight tunnel, you had to climb up the face of the cliff using hand and toe holds, thank goodness the NPS added steel guide rails (chains).   The original inhabitants had to go in and out this way.