The great kiva complex at Pueblo Bonito

It is early morning, November 11, 1980 and the visitors’ center is not open. I sit in my car waiting. And watching. Watching the meditation unfold in front of me here on my first pilgrimage to Chaco Canyon National Monument. A Dine (Navajo) man is slowly, methodically and silently sweeping the entrance sidewalk, starting from one side and carefully making his way to the other. Not with a store bought broom, but rather a hand made broom from brush and plants gathered from the area. Unlike me, the man is not in a hurry. He is bent over somewhat, intent on each sweep of the broom, each passage down the sidewalk like a reverent monk at a Buddhist temple. There is no one else but us around. We two and the early morning birds, unseen insects and other life forms waking up to the day. Deep breath, palms together, deep bow as Chaco greets me, conveying a message that I will carry with me through the decades of visits I will make through to the present.

For over 2,000 years Pueblo peoples occupied a vast region of the Southwest in the U.S. Chaco Canyon, a major center of ancestral Pueblo culture between 850 and 1250, was a focus for ceremonials, trade and political activity. It is remarkable for its monumental public and ceremonial buildings and distinctive architecture. It appears that it was both solar and lunar cycles were integrated into the architecture http://www.solsticeproject.org/lunarmark.htm Huge building sites were in alignment with each other over many miles and great straight roads radiated out from the center of the Canyon to distant outlying settlements. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archaeoastronomy#Chaco_Canyon

Light in the Kiva (underground ceremonial chamber)

Some who visit the Canyon feel an ominous energy. Over the 30 years of personal visits and leading Earth Walks groups https://earthwalks.org/ here, my experiences have been only positive and transformational. The indigenous Native American people who guide our groups revere Chaco as their ancestral home and approach the Canyon appropriately. I have chosen to do so as well.  Come join Earth Walks as we travel to Chaco in May 2017.  May you Walk in Beauty!–Doug Conwell, Earth Walks Director

Full moon over the Canyon

Saludos!  The Earth Walks to Chaco Canyon May 20-22, 2016 is nearly full.  If you have been thinking about going, register as soon as you can to reserve your place.  The trip will be led by a wonderful family from Tesuque Pueblo who consider this a “homecoming” to the site of their ancestors.  I think you’ll find it an inspiring “coming home” as well.

Happy Trails,

Doug Conwell

Pueblo Bonito Kiva and Complex at Chaco

August 11, 2012:  I am on a solo journey to Chaco Canyon.  I take a favorite walk from the Great Kiva Rinconada through the south gap towards the trail that leads to the mesa above the kiva and the ancient site of Tsin Kletzin.  The subterranean Great Kiva was once utilized for religious activities and ceremonies.  It had 39 foot passageways from the underground structure to above ground levels. Casa Rinconada is one of the many buildings in the Chaco area that have documented astronomical alignments.

On the walk all was silent save for the wind. Suddenly I encounter two large deer, or possibly elk or antelope.  There are two farther on.  How they survive in this harsh environment should be a lesson to us all.  I feel blessed by their wild animal presence.  Back in camp, I sit in mottled shade of nearby low growing cliff bushes and create prayer sticks for friends facing challenges as well offerings to my home.  Knees bent, “feet standing,” I silently wind colored yarn, feathers and other found objects into the sticks.

These “ofrendas” are a meditation practice given to me long ago at the LBGTQ Spirituality Gathering at Lama retreat center north of Taos, NM by Maria Elena.  Maria Elena is of Mexican Huichol ancestry and had the gift of being a “dream healer.”  She could enter into the dream world of a person and offer help and interpretation.  As a young child in Los Angeles, where her Mexican parents had immigrated, she occasionally found herself in that dream world, seemingly floating above her bed and having other unusual experiences.  Experiences that her parents did not want her to have, as they had immigrated to the U.S. to forge a new and hopefully more prosperous life.  So, they put her in parochial school to help her forget the old ways.  But Spirit will have its way, no matter where we are.  At school, Maria Elena made friends with an African American maintenance man and together they went out to the desert and did prayer and ceremony,  further deepening her healing abilities. This secretive time in ceremony and prayer helped her make sense of her natural talents. Maria Elena said that if she had been living in her Huichol community in Mexico, the elders would have recognized her gift and taken her to be trained in the ways of their people.  Fortunately for me and many others, she did not lose that gift and indeed was willing to share some of her healing ways.

Back to Chaco and the prayer sticks.  As I sat there quietly making prayer sticks, slowly sliding out of the low bushes emerged a two foot snake that just as quietly made her way under my legs, stopping briefly among the colored balls of yarn and feathers to give me a quick glance, then travel on her merry way.  For some indigenous cultures, the snake is the most sacred of animals as it travels with its heartbeat closed to that of Mother Earth.  I was both in awe and gratitude for this silent serpentine gift.

Earlier in the day driving into Chaco, the cell phone buzzed with a message from work at the public schools in Santa Fe.  As I listened, I recoiled and contracted, wanting to be as far from an increasingly difficult work situation as possible. But soon thereafter I heard this internalized message:  “Say yes! to all that does not compromise you or your core values…keep your spirit shield firmly in place, beware delusional thinking, but do not contract in fear of change or letting go to new conditions or requirements or adaptations to the material world.”  Perhaps this was the message the snake was giving me in advance of our special encounter.

Join Earth Walks May 20–22, 2016 on a special journey to Chaco Canyon, led by a wonderful Pueblo family.  To them–and perhaps you as well–this will be a homecoming journey.  Contact Earth Walks for more information…the trip is designed for only 12 participants, so be in touch as soon as you can.  (This fall, Earth Walks will journey to Canyon de Chelly, Arizona.  We are available to also create your own special trip in Santa Fe, New Mexico or the Southwest USA)

Happy Trails,          Doug Conwell     Santa Fe, New Mexico

Pueblo Bonito Kiva and Complex at Chaco

Earth Walks will journey to the amazing World Heritage Site of Chaco Canyon May 20-22, 2016.  Chaco was the ancient center of the Pueblo Anasazi world between 850 and 1250 A.D.  Today the massive buildings of the ancestral Pueblo peoples still testify to the organizational and engineering abilities not seen anywhere else in the American Southwest. This includes phenomenal archaeoastronmical buildings and natural sites aligned with solar and lunar cycles.

Our Earth Walks experience is designed for a deeper contact with the canyon and the ancient ones whose voices still can be heard in the stones, wind, wide open skies and bright starry skies.  We will be led by a wonderful family from Tesuque Pueblo, who consider Chaco an important site of their ancestors.  It will be a homecoming to them, and perhaps to participants as well.

“The Power of Storytelling” is the focus of this journey.  Sharing stories brings back the oldest way of being connected and seeking coherence in a world that often seems to be falling apart.  As Michael Meade of the Mosaic Multicultural Foundation has said, “Genuine stories help us to restore ourselves and re-story the world around us.”

As we walk the ancient sites with our Pueblo friends, experience silence alone among the vast open space of Chaco or gather around the fire at night we will share the stories that call to us from past and present that will help reweave the fabric of our individual and collective lives.

Join us!  Space is limited to 12 participants so sign up soon by emailing Earth Walks for a registration form.  Cost is $210 which includes all meals, campsite fee and honorarium to Pueblo guides.  Transportation is by carpooling (minimal car entrance fee not included in cost.)

“The purpose of pilgrimage is to come home and realize your own backyard is sacred ground.”
—Thich Nhat Hahn, Vietnamese Buddhist teacher

This has been a wonderful year with special Earth Walks journeys to Chaco Canyon, NM and Canyon de Chelly, AZ.  An integral part of the experience was service activities to the Native American communities where we travel.  For Chaco Canyon, ancestral homeland for Pueblo people of the region, we helped dig and plant a garden for Tewa Women United, an organization in the Santa Fe, NM area.  http://tewawomenunited.org/  TWU is involved in many activities and services of their own and we were delighted to add our own efforts to their work.

The great kiva complex at Pueblo Bonito

In Canyon de Chelly http://www.nps.gov/cach/index.htm  we visited with an elder Dine (Navajo) weaver on her family farm.  Huge rains this year had inundated her fruit trees and massive weeds had grown up.  During our visit we dug out some of the trees and fed the cut weeds to her goats and sheep who happily received them.

Spider Rock in Canyon de Chelly

Kathryn Pemala                            Dine (Navajo) weaver

Due to the interest in these two amazing places and the native cultures and traditions that they embody, Earth Walks will return to them in 2016.  Watch for the exact dates in a future message, but Chaco will be the next to the last week in May and Canyon de Chelly will again be in the fall.

If you would like to create your own special Earth Walks for friends, family, business groups or other organizations, please contact us. Service to the local communities is always a part of the journey. In the meantime, have a wonderful holiday season and may we all “Walk in Beauty” throughout the coming New Year!

—–Doug Conwell, Director of Earth Walks, Santa Fe, NM USA