Canyon de Chelly - Day Two

The second day of the Navajo Oral History project group's visit to Canyon de Chelly was just as eventful as the first.

The morning started with a delicious breakfast of blue corn pancakes, sausage, frybread, and fruit.

The group headed out early on a hike to Bad Canyon, a small box canyon that features small ruins and some amazing rock art panels that include both pictographs (images painted or stained onto a wall) and petroglyphs (images pecked into the surface of a rock wall).

(above five photos by Nik Strand)

(above three photos by Whitney Harlos)

(above photo by Elise Nelson)

(above five photos by Darin Strohmenger)

Then the group did a longer hike around the base of Dog Rock, a large rock formation that sits at the junction of Canyon Del Muerto and Canyon de Chelly, and that looks like a reclining dog when viewed at the correct angle, from the Nave Camp.

(above photo by Nik Strand)

Shiloh Gulbranson puts her hand in a petroglyph of a bear paw on the wall below Dog Rock. (photo by Adam Maciejczak)

(above photo by Skylar Ogren)

After lunch and some time to rest, the group rode in trucks to Antelope House ruins in Canyon Del Muerto. Here is where some of the most well-preserved pictographs exist. Protected from the elements by a rock cliff-shelf, the pictographs have not eroded much in all the years since they were painted. Archaeologists estimated some of the pictographs at the Antelope House site were drawn as early as 900 A.D. Other images were added in the 1500s and 1600s when Navajos began living in and around the canyon.

(above photo by Darin Strohmenger)

(above two photos by Nik Strand)

(above photo by Elise Nelson)

While at Antelope House Ruins, the NOH 2013 group ran into Travis Terry, a well-known Native American flute player, who has produced several CDs of his music, inspired by Canyon de Chelly. He stopped to talk with the group and played an informal mini-concert.  

(above four photos by Brett Gustafson)

(above photo by Whitney Harlos)

Supper consisted of a hearty beef and vegetable stew with camp-made tortillas.

(above photo by Whitney Harlos)

Many of the students played a rowdy game of Ultimate Football in the evening before turning in for the night. Others hung around the camp fire and played silly camp games such as Queen Anne and Whoop Johnny.

Day 13 - Ye'i Trail and Antelope House Ruins

Saturday, June 19, 2011, was a loooooong day for the members of the 2011 Navajo Oral History project.

The day started with a delicious breakfast of sausage, eggs and blue corn pancakes prepared by Flemen Nave and his daughter, Becky.

The group then hiked up Ye'i Trail: a trail that leads straight up the 350 foot high Canyon de Chelly canyon walls. The hikers used toe and hand holds carved in the rock hundreds of years ago, supplemented by bars and cables installed in the 1930s by the Civilian Conservation Corps.

Thomas Litson, our Navajo guide, who grew up in the canyon told us many stories of how he and his relatives ran up and down this trail several times a day, carrying feed for livestock, firewood, etc. Most in our group had rubbery legs when they reached the top.

(Above six photos by Alex Fisher)

After a three-mile hike across the fields on the canyon rim, we descended the Antelope House trail, ending at the famous Antelope House ruins. They get their name from the well-preserved rock art above the ruins.

(Above two photos by Alex Fisher)

We had a nice picnic lunch there and returned to the Nave Family's land for an afternoon of rest.

Dinner was a delicious stew of ground beef, beans, corn, tomatoes, onions, potatoes, and carrots, handmade tortillas, and watermelon for dessert.

After Dinner, Lettie Nave, who grew up in Canyon de Chelly with her parents, aunts and uncles, grandparents and siblings, gave a presentation on Navajo culture including discussion of weaving, native plants and their use, basketry, pottery-making, spinning wool, traditional hair-tying.

Still tired from hiking, everyone crashed early Saturday night in their tents in Canyon de Chelly, with the sound of horses wandering by and cows mooing.