Flaming House Ruin

Our next stop was to find the Flaming House Ruin. This ruin is located in a canyon off of rt 95 west of Bluff. The images of this ruin that one finds online are spectacular. In reality it is not quite as spectacular but it is still mighty impressive. After a leisurely half hour walk criss-crossing a dry creek bed we reached the path up to the ruin. Luckily the creek was bone dry as we crossed it many times and even walked in the creek bed. In the rainy season, it would be pretty messy hike. There is a very short bit of slick rock to climb up to view the ruin. There are several dwellings snuggled under an overhang. The sun reflecting off the slick rock lights up the overhang, giving it the name Flaming House Ruin. The photo to the left was taken around 11am before the sun came over the overhang.

There are many such ruins in the 4 Corners area. They were inhabited by the Anasazi for about 800-900 years until they abruptly picked up stakes and moved toward the south. The reason for that is unclear but most archeologists feel that it was due to a sustained drought.

There were a few nooks and crannies that it was fun to poke around it...Here's Judy thinking about doing some climbing

And I got a little wedged under a boulder and was about to go all "127 Hours" when Judy reminded me that I could easily just pull my arm free.

On the way in the canyon, we spotted this rock which reminded us of one of our favorite books, Angle of Repose, by Wallace Stegner. With a little more angle, this particular rock won't be reposing much longer.