The Setting

Sand Canyon’s ancient Puebloan ruins are slowly being destroyed by insensitive visitors and centuries of weathering. Can this area in southwestern Colorado be preserved and still remain accessible for visitors? Experiential vacations, the kind that get visitors to roll up their sleeves and get involved in archeological preservation, are proving to be the saving grace of the remnants of early civilization in Sand Canyon.

For more than a millennium a culture thrived in what is now the southwestern United States. The people—who called themselves a name that no one now knows—hewed intricate apartment-like dwellings out of canyon cliffs. Belonging to four distinct linguistic groups, these natives, nevertheless, shared common cultural traditions, from basket-making to agronomy and the creation and use of pottery. Originally known collectively as the “Anasazi,” a Navajo word roughly translated as “ancient ones,” they are referred to today as Ancient Puebloan People. Their archeological legacy is extensive but endangered.

Sand Canyon is a significant source of Anasazi ruins. The red-rock canyon lies adjacent to McElmo Canyon, home of Kelly Place. Rodney and Kristie Carriker have operated Kelly Place (named for the original owners, horticulturists George and Sue Kelly) since 1980. Two years after they opened, Elderhostel in Boston chose Kelly Place as its first off-campus site in the nation. The Carrikers worked with Elderhostel to offer hiking, biking, horseback riding, pottery, and archeology education programs to older adults. Then, in 1990, the Carrikers founded the McElmo Canyon Research Institute (MCRI) and began using the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) Sand Canyon Resource Area as one of the main outdoor attractions for their guests.

It was while leading guided tours into Sand Canyon, that the Carrikers realized the urgency of stemming the deterioration occurring there. But the size of the job was daunting. There were so many sites in Sand Canyon alone that BLM hadn’t even been able to document them all—much less do the necessary work to protect the ruins from further deterioration.

Back in 1987 BLM had completed a cultural resources management plan for the area. As a result, the area had been closed to motorized vehicles. In 1990, BLM had opened up the six-mile-long Sand Canyon Trail in an attempt to protect the landscape from further erosion by keeping visitors on just one path. The trail had worked well for a few years and had attracted hikers, horseback riders, and mountain bikers alike. But as Sand Canyon became more popular, concerns about visitor impact grew.

By 1996, Sand Canyon was attracting more than 10,000 visitors—as compared to just 500 in 1986. With budget and staffing limitations, BLM simply did not have the funds to manage the impact of that many visitors. Then came talk of seasonal closures to give Sand Canyon time to recover.

Seasonal closures of Sand Canyon would affect the Carriker’s livelihood and others as well. Sand Canyon was a major attraction not only for their guests, but for many outdoor adventure tourists visiting the Four Corners area. There had to be a way to keep Sand Canyon accessible and open to the public.

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