Day 13: Mesa Verde
Day 13 of the 1933 Harley-Davidson VL cross-country ride was a short-mileage Mesa Verde day with coyotes before dawn, cliff-dwelling stops inside the park, and a late transmission filler plug fix in Cortez.
Day 13 Ride Stats
- Date: October 1, 2015
- Start: Mesa Verde National Park campground, Colorado
- Finish: Mesa Verde National Park campground, Colorado
- Distance: 67.3 miles
- Route: Mesa Verde campground to Park Point, Chapin Mesa / Cliff Palace area, and an evening run to Cortez for a replacement transmission filler plug
- Motorcycles: 1933 Harley-Davidson VL and 1934 Harley-Davidson VLD
- Gas added: 2.622 gallons total
- Oil added: none recorded
- Roadside issues: missing transmission filler plug discovered during the park day; temporary rag fix used until a replacement plug was sourced from Chrome Mafia in Cortez, with transmission fluid topped off and the new plug installed
Day 13 Ride Journal
Day 13 wasn’t a Friday, but it sounded like it was an unlucky day for some of the local wildlife. At around 5 AM, we were awakened by howls from a pack of coyotes who had just made a kill. That really came as no surprise as the local deer population was so tame that they just walked in and out of the campsites, oblivious to the campers. Probably made for easy pickings for the resident carnivores.
Leaving the campground, our first stop was Park Point. Located at over 8,500 feet and overlooking the two mesas that comprise the park, Park Point does double duty as a scenic overlook and a fire tower. A small glass-walled building located at its summit provides an excellent vantage point for the rangers to keep an eye on the entire park.
As we got deeper inside the park, we split off toward Chapin Mesa and some of the larger cliff dwellings. On the top of this mesa were various pit houses, dating back to 600 AD. Apparently the first American Indians who settled this region preferred to live in homes built into the earth on the summit of the mesa. These round pits were covered by a wooden roof, which made them somewhat dangerous since cooking and heating were handled by open fire pits inside the structure. Many excavated structures show evidence of fire damage.
Generations later, around 1200 AD, these same peoples moved down to the cliff faces and built the structures that the park is known for. Archaeologists can only theorize why this change took place. The largest cliff dwelling called “Cliff Palace” was being repaired during our visit, but we could still get a good view of it from atop the cliff. What I found amazing about this site was that it only housed around 100 people. Considering the amount of work it must have taken to haul all the supplies up the cliff, that was quite a feat for such a small group.
There are over 4,700 archaeological sites in Mesa Verde and after a full day of riding and hiking we barely scratched the surface on what was there to see. Several restaurants, gift shops and bathrooms are spaced throughout the park, which is incredibly convenient when you don’t have room for a cooler and a picnic basket. They even had a gas station at the campground, so everything we needed was available without having to leave the park.
One of the most exciting things that happened on our tour of Mesa Verde occurred when I realized that I had lost my transmission filler plug. I guess I forgot to tighten it and it fell off somewhere in the park. A rag stuffed in the opening got me through the day, but when we returned to camp we started making calls to locate a replacement. The good news was that Harley has used the same size plug for about 50 years and although they didn’t have one at Durango Harley-Davidson, they did direct me to an independent shop called Chrome Mafia in nearby Cortez. I caught the guys at Chrome Mafia just before closing time and they agreed to leave a plug for me in the mailbox. Needless to say, I headed straight to Cortez, topped off my transmission fluid and installed the new plug.
Even just riding around Mesa Verde, we still logged around 60 miles for the day and got to spend most of the time stretching our legs, which was a nice change of pace.
