Pueblo Bonito is the center of ancient culture known as Chacoan.  The Chocoan Culture began here and spread to other parts of New Mexico, and parts of Utah, Colorado, and Arizona.  Who are the Chacoans today?  Pueblo Indians of New Mexico, Hopi, and the Navajo all have histories with the ancient Chacoans. 

Pueblo Bonito is full of incredible ruins and examples of advanced masonry built by the ancestral pueblo peoples from the years 850 to 1150 AD.  If you only have one day at Chaco then this should be the site for you to see.

I won’t go into too much of the history since I could not do it justice.  You can find out more from the National Park Website: https://www.nps.gov/chcu/learn/historyculture/index.htm

Once you stop at the visitor center to pay the entrance fee and get a map, you can experience Pueblo Bonito in two ways: self-guided tour or guided tour.  I did both and I recommend you do the same, but you can do a self-guided tour after your guided tour and experience the ruins at your own pace.

It is a short drive from the visitor center to Pueblo Bonito.  You will need to walk about 800 ft from the parking lot to the actual Pueblo Bonito though.  The overall adventure is relatively flat and easy hiking.  There is a part with some stairs, but you can bypass this part if you want.  There is also a really fun spot where you can go through parts of the buildings, so you will need to crouch a little and this spot is avoidable too. 

I spent two days in Chaco Canyon and the very first thing I did was a self-guided tour of Pueblo Bonito.

Self-Guided Tour

Obviously there are pros and cons to either of these two tour options.  The self-guided tour will miss out on lots of insight, stories, and just the overall information of the area in general.  That being said, you can still have a fun and enjoyable experience on your own – I sure did!

Pueblo Bonito is set up as an open area so you are free to explore in the many of the open areas and even some of the rooms.  Of course, you aren’t allowed to jump down in the kivas or climb over the walls to access other parts of the ruins. In general, you shouldn’t be touching or leaning on the buildings or walls.  The ruins are extremely fragile and you can see where bracing has been put to stabilize walls.  Please be respectful and just take pictures.

I started my self-guided tour by hiking on the east side of Pueblo Bonito.   Immediately, you can see the tall walls and unique masonry that kept all these ruins together for more than a thousand years! You can peek inside the windows to view the rooms that make up much of the structure.  It must have taken immense amounts of water to create the mortar for all the rocks and bricks.  There are few places for water in the park, but none directly located at Pueblo Bonito.  Just imagine the time consuming efforts of bringing water in pots from afar to create so many buildings!

The trail circles around large boulders that broke off the cliffs and destroyed part of the northeast corner of Pueblo Bonito.   On the guided tour, our guide said that the ancient Chacoans knew this would one day collapse and put many prayer feathers in it.  The trail goes through part of these boulders so you can get a higher vantage point.  You can see down inside some of the rooms too.  The trail then goes behind where you can see some stabilization and bracing efforts by the Park Service.

From here the trail goes into the center plazas at Pueblo Bonito or it goes west to the nearby Wetherill Cemetery.

I hiked up to the Wetherill Cemetery which was kind of neat to see.  I didn’t know this at the time, but you can actually drive pretty close to the cemetery so it’s up to you if you want to add it on to your visit to Pueblo Bonito.  An archaeologist and homesteader by the name of Richard Wetherill and his wife Marietta are buried at this small cemetery.  Richard was actually murdered in 1910 here at Chaco. 

Richard is a source of contention even to this day at Chaco.  Many people think that his archaeological methods were destructive and some think he did a lot of preservation.  I won’t go into too much detail in this Trek though.  There are also graves of a few Navajo Indians here too.

Back at Pueblo Bonito – The trail cuts through some now broken rooms and into the main plaza area.  This massive open space was probably for daily living and the trading of goods.  Make sure you check out some of the kivas that go into the ground.  Be careful as some of them are quite deep!  Standing in the middle of the plaza, it was fun to imagine myself as an ancient Chacoan.  I could really see this place busy with visitors, trade, daily life, and spiritual ceremonies.

Directly to the east there is a small narrow path that goes through a brick tunnel then into some of the rooms.  You are allowed to explore in this portion and I recommend you do if you are able.  You will pass through several rooms and take note of the height of the walls and rooms!  You will see windows at some of the corners of the rooms that would have brought in light.  The pathway goes through several open rooms that are fun to explore.  You will notice that on the inside of the rooms there used to be plaster on the walls.  Most of that plaster is gone but you can see some of it still clinging to the walls.

There is one room that you MUST see.  It’s one of the original rooms that still has a thatched and wooded ceiling.  Everything in this room is original except for the plaster on the walls.  Take a few moments to stand in the room and imagine that it’s 1000 AD and you have just arrived from your far-away home hoping that you will learn and see new things at Chaco.  You have just come to Chaco to trade goods, learn new knowledge, engage in spiritual ceremony, and gain spiritual light and wisdom.  As you are standing in this room, you are full of excitement at these large buildings that you have never seen before.  Thousands of people live in this canyon and you feel like you are part of them and their way of life.

Not much is known about these rooms because evidence doesn’t support the theory that people lived in these rooms.  Were they for visitors?  We don’t know.

I spent more time taking photos and then set up my camp for the night.

Where are all the petroglyphs and pictographs?  There aren’t many around Pueblo Bonito.  There are tons, however, on the hike out to Peñasco Blanco that I’ll show you in a different Trek.  Why do you think there isn’t rock art at where the center of the Chaco World is located?  It’s interesting to think about…

Guided Tour

On my last day in Chaco Canyon I was at the visitor center speaking with a park ranger when he asked me if I was going on the guided Pueblo Bonito tour.  I told him I wasn’t planning on it, but it was easy to convince me so I got on the tour right away!  There aren’t daily tours of Pueblo Bonito so make sure you check with the park so you come on a day when there is a tour available.  The tour runs from about 45 minutes to an hour and all you do is meet at the trailhead of Pueblo Bonito at the designated time.

The guided tour took almost the exact same route I took when I was exploring on my own.  Our tour guide was a volunteer who has been at Chaco Canyon for many years.  She had lots of wonderful insight and asked many thought provoking questions.  Many of things at Chaco are still unknown and or pure speculation so it was interesting to hear what her thoughts were on some of the tour topics.

We learned on our guided tour that Pueblo Bonito wasn’t all built at one time.  It started much smaller than it was slowly added to as the years went by.  They know this by some of the dating techniques used to date the timber used at Pueblo Bonito.  Most of the structures are made from rock and mortar, but lumber was used to create the ceilings, roofs, doorways, and other things.

Our guide told us that the lumber used here was brought many miles away and that once the tree was cut, the ancient Chacoans would carry the wood back while running.  They would have a relay system set up so that one person would run so far and then hand the wood over to the next person who would run to the next person, and so forth until Chaco Canyon.  They wouldn’t let the wood touch the ground too.

Another interesting thing our guide mentioned is that archaeologists have found feathers from macaw parrots from Mexico at Chaco Canyon.  The colorful feathers were highly prized and multiple bird skeletons have been found here too.  Many of the original artifacts uncovered are now in museums or were unfortunately stolen. You may be lucky to find some pottery shards on the ground and please leave them there to be discovered by others,.

You may be wondering why the parking lot is over 800 ft away from Pueblo Bonito.  Our guide said that years ago the parking was originally close by, but after years and years of large rumbling trucks and vehicles going by they had to move the parking.  The large vehicles would rumble as they drove by and the delicate walls of Pueblo Bonito would shake and slowly crumble.

Our guide mentioned that Chaco was the center of a larger community that stretched out hundreds of miles.  The ancient Chacoans built a systems of roads all over that led to the center of this ancient civilization.  Many of the roads have been destroyed or are very faint, but you can still see hints of them in satellite photos and on some of the hiking trails.

The Chacoans were very aware of the stars and the movements of the sun and moon.  Pueblo Bonito is situated to align with sun solstices and there are even petroglyphs on top of a nearby butte (Fajada Butte) to tell the Chacoans when the solstice is nearing.

Our guide led us through the same spot where you can see the original room and this is where the tour ended.  She brought lots of pictures and diagrams of Pueblo Bonito and I wished I had taken photos of all of them, but sadly I didn’t.