Balcony House ruin was an incredible place, but was the most frightening place to "get to" and "get out from". To enter the site, one has to ascend a 32 foot ladder perched on the edge of a cliff! The platform made me feel a little better about things, but not much.

Once I reached the top of the cliff I leaned over (verrry carefully) and took this photo of the rest of our group making their ascent to the site.

Here at Balcony House ruin, you can see the structures first hand. Balcony site was perhaps the smaller of the three sites we had visited, but the most harrowing to enter.

Two beautiful Kivas grace the Balcony House ruin.

Here is the view from Balcony House.

In order to leave Balcony House and return to the mesa above, one has to crawl through a 12 foot long, 18 inch wide tunnel, and scale a 60 foot open rock face via two 10 foot ladders and about 40 feet of footing carved into the cliff face. I won't pretend I wasn't praying on the way up! I took this shot (once I came back to my senses and caught my breath) to give you an idea of what I'm trying to describe. Incredible.

Mary Ann sitting amoungst the Far View House ruin, the last of the ruins we had time to see. The people who lived here 700 years ago were primarily farmers. Included in this site were nearly 50 villages within a half square mile area.

Another view of Far View House, which included 4 Kivas within its walls. Because of its larger size, Far View House may have been a place where public meeting were held.

Here is what remains of Far View Tower and affliated structures. Sadly, there was not enough time to see all of these sites, and regrettably, we left Mesa Verde on our way to Arches National Park. We will return to Mesa Verde sometime in the near future to see more of its incredible ancient structures.

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