Thenaturalmedic Adventures
Hello there, and thanks so much for joining us here! You are probably wondering what this podcast is all about? In this podcast, we will talk about all sorts of outdoor adventures, but primarily, for now, we will focus on hiking and backpacking. No other outdoor adventure is so accessible to so many people! So please join us as we talk about how to hike/backpack and learn how to hike any length trail from your local neighborhood parks to those long trails such as the Appalachian and others worldwide! Remember... "in every walk with nature; one receives far more than he seeks... - John Muir " See you on the trail!
Thenaturalmedic Adventures
Echoes in Stone: Uncovering the Secrets of El Morro National Monument
Note: Audio Only Podcast!
Discover the hidden stories etched into the stones of El Morro National Monument as I, Craig the Natural Medic, guide you through a journey of awe and intrigue. Learn how inscriptions from ancient Pueblo dwellers, Spanish explorers, and early American settlers offer a mesmerizing glimpse into the lives and adventures of those who once traversed this mystical land. Explore the breathtaking vistas of the Headlands Trail and uncover secrets along the Inscription Rock Trail, including the curious cases of woodpecker arch and mysterious metal disks. This episode promises a journey not just through history, but into the heart of human experience, connecting us to souls long gone yet ever-present in their messages carved in stone.
Join me in exploring the efforts to preserve this monument’s remarkable heritage, as we reflect on the transient nature of human life through the marks left by travelers like Mr. RH Kern and Felipe de Arellano. El Morro is not just a place; it is a narrative, a living testament to the stories and histories that define us. As we navigate these trails, we’ll delve into the ongoing renovation endeavors to protect these ancient Pueblo structures. By the end of our adventure, you'll understand why El Morro remains a testament to the myriad lives that have crossed its path. If you find our exploration compelling, I invite you to support the channel with a thumbs up and subscribe for more thrilling adventures. Happy trails!
Hello there, this is Craig the Natural Medic, coming at you from outside of Rama, new Mexico, in El Morro National Monument. Here I am in this beautiful place. There's two trails here. One is partially closed due to snow and ice. It's called the Headlands Trail, which goes on top of this mesa here. The other trail is the inscription rock trail, which goes down over. In there, I believe, there's a ton of inscriptions from ancient Pueblo dwellers to a pretty modern age man. Let's check it out, starting to climb on top of the bluff here and lots of stairs to go up on the Headlands Trail, which is fine, totally fine. Oh, wow, look at the view, beautiful view of the valley. So you had people living up here on ancient pueblos. Living up here on ancient pueblos, you had the Spanish visiting Other Native American groups and finally the Americans. What is now New Mexico was up in to homesteading. Imagine what they thought when they saw this big outcropping of rock, great vantage point right here. I believe you can see inscription rock ahead of me. Hey, you're liking this video. Make sure to give it a thumbs up to show your approval. That gets out more people on YouTube, thanks.
Speaker 1:Here's some of the Pueblo structures. They're doing some renovation work. As a sign earlier stated, some of the walls fell down during the torrential downpour in summer of 2022. So that's what they're looking at there. It's like a Kiva structure, just their religious meeting place. Right here are those structures I was showing you. That's called atsina, which means where pictures are on the rock. It was occupied roughly between 1275-1400 and the ancestors of the Zuni people who lived there. They excavated 18 rooms between the mid 1950s and 1960s and now they're trying to halt deterioration. Pretty interesting that they were able to find this stuff. So there's a look at the panel right here, a little sweep of that.
Speaker 1:On the backside of the rock itself, on the west side of it, northwest side of it, there's a small box canyon. Pretty cool, pretty cool. Yeah, the trail's a little bit hard to follow in places, but you have some rock cairns like the ones right ahead of me here that you can follow. They'll take you through. Got some steps through the little alcove there, which it may have held water, or it may hold water at times when it's wet here. These stairs took a lot of work. I'll tell you that I've got a rough path, kind of cut through the top of the rock here that you can follow all across the top of the rocks. More steps, let's go to get a little further on the top here. I guess I'm on the uh west side of Inscription Rock, on top of the Headlands Trail.
Speaker 1:The trail continues this way on the other side of that box canyon that I showed you a little earlier, with the kind of pointy formation right in the middle of it. There's supposed to be a natural feature that we can see a little further down this way. Let's go check it out Now for a special treat. That is woodpecker arch up there. It kind of defies classification, but it looks like a woodpecker from this angle. So I definitely see that. How cool is that? Yeah, it really looks like a giant woodpecker just hammering on the side of that bluff there on the mesa.
Speaker 1:Let's zoom in a little bit. That's crazy, isn't it? I'm doing this backwards, but right here you have a cross, you have some writing and looks like spanish shorthand maybe, and you have some english. When this gentleman, who was mr r RH Kern, the Philadelphia artist deployed by the Army as a topographer, he left the first English inscription on the rock here Might be a little hard to see, but there it is. Then underneath there's a Spanish inscription left by Felipe de Aureliano. Sorry, felipe, I hope I'm not butchering your name there, buddy. The Spanish inscription says I am the hand that is written by Felipe de Arellano on the 16th of September, soldier.
Speaker 1:And one thing you should notice if you can read it, it says inceptions instead of inscriptions. Kern, when he was here, he documented all the different inscriptions that were on the rock. There's another one of his inscriptions right there. There's a cross, some other things Pretty cool. One thing I've noticed, you may have noticed here there's these little metal disks that are stuck in the rock. There's one there, there's one over here. There's one there, there's one over here, there's some more as you go this way back towards the front of the trail. And there's one over here on this rock area over here. Those discs are not explained in the guide here, but I'm assuming those are, maybe so they can record or document the amount of rock that is coming off of the rock face here.
Speaker 1:Stop 22, which is the longest inscription on the rock, written by Governor Yulante, and it says I may not be able to read it, but it says the governor and captain general of the provinces of New Mexico, for our king and our lord passed by here, returning from the Zuni Pueblos on July 29, 1620. He left them in peace at their request, asking his favor. As his vassals of his majesty, they were again rendered with obedience he did with all attention, zeal, prudence and such a particular Christian gentleman and gallant soldier of unending praiseworthy memory. And it appears that where a gentleman, if you can see that, has been crossed out, it's right straight in front of the frame there here at stop 21, which you may have trouble reading due to the shadows over here. It says the 14th day of July 1736. General Juan Pais Hurtado, inspector, passed by here. Underneath it it reads In his company, corporal Joseph Trubito. I don't know if you can see that very well, but there it is Pretty cool Should maybe be able to get a two for one here.
Speaker 1:Stop 20, which really isn't explained what's going on here, but it does talk about earlier, when this became a national monument. It became the second national monument in 1906 after Devil's Tower, and in order to preserve these, all the ones were removed that were put on the rock after when they were attempted to be removed after 1906, and they put yucca plants close to the rock to discourage people from coming up there and trying to carve their own inscriptions now. Now, stop 19. Let's talk about it. Stop 19 is actually a poem and it reads. It reads the Lord and Governor, don Francisco Manuel de Silva Nieto, came this far with our Lord's King's wagons, with his indubitable arm and valor, he has already overcome the impossible, a thing which he accomplished alone, august 5th 1629. So one may well proceed to his uni and carry the holy faith.
Speaker 1:There is a sign here posted that reminds you not to make a costly mistake. You can get fined or face five years in prison. It's a felony $100,000 fine if you deface the park here. These are historic inscriptions. No other inscriptions are allowed at this time. And also by taking anything from the park or anything like that, you have to think about all the different inscriptions that are on here. There's lots of them. Can't really say detail on all of them, but they are eroding away. So they're talking about in this particular setting here that it's hard to preserve them and they're doing different efforts in order to do preservation.
Speaker 1:Something I've covered in a previous video was talking about the Pueblo Revolt, when I was at the Pecos, and this gentleman here, don Diego Vargas was a governor of New Mexico when it was a Spanish colony, spanish territory. His inscription is up here right below the tree branch, don Diego. And there's several other inscriptions here. There's just way too many to cover all of them. But he was of significance because he reestablished Spanish rule after the Pueblo Revolt of 1680. So one of the oldest and more famous inscriptions was Don Juan de Onante and he inscribed on 1605, 15 years before the pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock. He was the first governor of New Mexico. As I said earlier, it's unlawful to deface or mark it.
Speaker 1:Here's some graffiti of various types on here. Here's some native glyphs. These are similar to the ones that you may have seen in my Crow Canyon video, which was up closer to Farmington. You've got some wavy line glyphs which I would say maybe is a snake or lightning. You've got big horn sheep. You've got the human type figures. You've got a bear paw, all kinds of things Going out over here. Is this one here which says Paso Por Aqui in Spanish, which means pass by here, several of those that were put on the rock.
Speaker 1:Yeah, interesting thing here at El Morro is they had what they called a camel corps and he had a gentleman named P for Peachy, gilmer Breckenridge. He inscribed his name here and he was in charge of the camel Corps. They brought camels as an experiment. To use them to travel across the deserts of the southwest from Fort Smith to California was the idea. Don't think it worked out. If you look here there's more petroglyphs, got some handprints. You've got some human type figures. Native Americans used antlers or bones of animals that they killed, while Spanish and Americans used tools such as chisels. Spanish and Americans used tools such as chisels, nails, daggers, things like that to make their names. You have a guy named Mr Long here. His name was. His name was my name too E Penn Long. He was the one that was to find the wagon route from Fort Smith to the Colorado River and Mr Long also was going to test the usefulness of camels. They passed by Elmore on 1857, and they abandoned the experiment prior to the Civil War.
Speaker 1:Over here you have what's known as the pool. This was a pretty much annual available water source that ancient trade routes depended on this and were used for this and were used for this. This was a known spot where you could water yourself and, I guess, whatever other animals you might have been traveling with For the Native Americans prior to Spanish arrival. They didn't have livestock or horses that we know of. Maybe livestock, but no horses, and this was definitely a good watering hole place. Perhaps a better view of the pool here, a little bit better scale of the actual bluff itself. If you look, this thing is huge. This is El Morro, and travelers stopped here because this is a reliable place to get a drink. It is not spring fed, it's rainfall from July, august, september, by melting snows. According to the park brochure, it never empties, it's all rainwater. The black areas that are on the rock there I'll show you some a little bit higher is where the water drains down the side of the cliff into the pool itself. You can even see some way up there where those trees are Pretty crazy.
Speaker 1:I hope you enjoyed our brief tour of the walking trails, hiking trails at El Morro. Maybe it gives you something to think about. What is your legacy going to be? What is the mark you're going to leave on the future? I want you to answer that question in the comments below or, if you're listening on the podcast, send me an email using the email link as to what your legacy is going to be, or you want it to be. And if you were legally able to ride on this rock known as El Morro, what would you write? I'm curious of your answers.
Speaker 1:We, as humans, are only here for a short time on this earth, but you can see that people that pass by this area left their mark, so to speak, on El Morro and left their inscription, and now Now remember them. There's so many inscriptions on here. This is a really cool place. If you ever in the area, need to come check it out. If you like this video, make sure to give it a thumbs up. Make sure to subscribe to the channel for more videos like this until next time. See you on the trail paso para key. I Passed by here.
