Montezuma Castle and Montezuma Well

Our second day trip while on vacation was to Montezuma. It was pretty interesting seeing the homes built into little coves on the side of a cliff.

They had a model made of it so people could see what the building actually looks like since no one is allowed to go inside anymore. I was amazed at how large it was. From the ground it doesn't look like more than a couple rooms, but it was quite elaborate.

There were little alcoves all over the side of the cliff where they had storage areas and other little rooms. It was actually pretty interesting to see.

While we were there, Ryan heard a group speaking Tagalog, so he started talking to them. He always surprises people when he does that. They usually ask if he married a Filipina, but he obviously didn't. Then they start asking him why he speaks Tagalog like a native. It's always a good conversation. In usual Filipino fashion, we were instant best friends because Ryan shared a common language with them. We all hung out while Ryan talked with them. They were a 4 generation group/family from Western Canada. It was a couple with a baby, both of their parents, and one set of grandparents. They were a lovely family. Before we parted ways, they wanted to take pictures of us and with us.

Now in front of the ruins.

 Now with some of the group.

Now with the whole group (except the man taking the picture).

Now some of the cute baby.

 (All of the above photos came from the family that we met.)



I was really surprised at how high up the cliff the buildings were. I pretty sure I would not want to raise little children up there. Could you imagine trying to keep a crazy toddler from trying to jump off the ledge? I think we have it bad trying to keep toddlers from jumping off the table or couch!

The kids all became junior rangers and were given a badge and sworn in. I'm pretty sure Ryan took a video or at least a picture, but I can't find it. I am assuming it is on his phone.

After Montezuma Castle, we went to Montezuma Well. It was pretty well hidden in the surrounding hills. If you didn't know it was there, you wouldn't find it. It was basically a hill that had the center of it dipped down with a little lake in the bottom of it. It was actually pretty far down, even though you can't really tell from the pictures. It was far enough down that we didn't want to hike down it with the impending storm.

 It was nice having a happy baby for the trip.

There were even ruins under the edge of the cliff. Don't ask me how anyone got in there or even how they crawled to the other rooms that were down a little further. The cliff was basically a sheer drop-off that went right to the water.

From the location of the well/lake, you could walk a little further down the other side of the hill and down through some rocks to see where the spring came out of the ground. It was a complete different world down there. Everything was so green and cool. It was very refreshing after being in the hot and muggy hills. The spring comes out of the ground right behind where everyone is standing in this picture and then flows along the side of the rocks until it goes into the nearby stream.

The stream is flowing right at the base of the rocks.

And merges with this little stream.

We were a little nervous walking down on that part of the trail because we saw the rocks that were right over our heads were just balancing there. I was fine (meaning completely oblivious) until Ryan pointed it out to me and then I was quite anxious to get out of there. We found this rock on the way out that looks like it was carved to look like a Native American. It was pretty interesting.

 Right after we left, the storms rolled in and gave us the most beautiful clouds to look at and down-poured rain on us. It was just perfect.