el morro

walking to california or wherever in the high desert is a dangerous business, not least because of the lack of water --- and so el morro in west-central new mexico was a great landmark since a natural pool of water collecting from run-off from the top of the headland was available more-or-less year round ---

and people being people have been scratching their names and what not in the rock for thousands of years --- the first european inscription was by juan de oñate in 1605, who did what any god-fearing explorer would do: he scratched his name on top of a native american petroglyph --- the archaeologists have helpfully highlighted his work there at upper left

the hike up and around the top of the rock was spectacular, following a trail marked by occasional stone cairns and parallel grooves incised in the rock --- 

it must be wild during a thunderstorm, but i just missed that experience, which is probably good, considering how every other pine tree had been struck at least once ---

at the top of the headland are some excellent anasazi ruins, called atsinna and home to 1500 people between about 1275 and 1350 ---- only some of the 875 or so rooms in the pueblo have been excavated