Towaoc – Ute Mountain Tribal Park guide Rick Hayes, walking stick in hand, forged well ahead of his group on Friday, eager to see inside Lion Canyon for the first time since the Dwelling fire blackened 200 acres around the awe-inspiring cliff houses of ancient Puebloans.
“It’s sad to see it this way,” Hayes said. “But lightning and fire are part of nature.”
The sandstone walls of the ruins and plentiful artifacts, from the 800-year-old cobs of maize that litter the ground to original vigas, or ceiling timbers, appear to be untouched by fire. No one has been in the sandstone alcoves where the ruins are perched because fire still crackles and pops in parts of the canyon.
Old-growth Douglas fir towering 150 feet high at the base of She House are reduced to tall black poles. The tall fir that defined the character of Tree House are scorched and brown. The vegetation around Fortified and Lion houses is burned.
“This was a lush, cool spot,” Hayes said as he looked into the canyon cove holding She House. “You could forget how hot the canyon is when you were here.”
Bureau of Indian Affairs fire manager Joe Morris asked Tom Rice, director of the tribe’s environment department, about the trees.
“What do you think we should do on rehab? Put ’em down or leave ’em,” Morris asked.
“Leave them, I think,” Rice said quietly.
Tribal park guide Gerald Ketchum said he will also miss the shady shelter that employees kept extending. It burned up along with picnic tables and two portable toilets at the Lion Canyon trailhead. The tribe hasn’t estimated the cost of the damage.
Veronica Cuthair, park director, has said the tribe is committed to rebuilding the trailhead structures with the help of volunteers from Durango and Denver chapters of an archaeological society.
A federal fire team had surrounded and contained the Dwelling fire by late Thursday. The cost of fire suppression is estimated at $378,000.
The tribal park is a 125,000-acre archaeological preserve on the Ute Mountain Ute Reservation just south of Cortez. The park lies on the southern edge of Mesa Verde National Park, which encompasses about 52,000 acres. The tribe, amid local controversy, has made the park available to the public only since 1981.
Hayes, who has been a guide at the tribal park since 1989, said many Utes didn’t want the area disturbed. They wanted to leave the spirits of their Ute ancestors and those of the ancient Puebloans in peace, he says.
But the tribe ultimately decided to exhibit the park’s treasures, as spectacular in their way as Mesa Verde’s. And the tribal park dwellings are far richer in artifacts than those of the national park it borders.
The tribal park has abundant remnants of everyday life in the cliffs and remarkable features, such as the painting that shines from a kiva wall at Eagle’s Nest. That site escaped flames.
Tours into Lion Canyon are suspended until further notice. Tours into other parts of the park continue.
Staff writer Electa Draper can be reached at 970-385-0917 or edraper@denverpost.com.
