I exited the museum and admired the towering cliffs all around me.

This natural bridge known as Crawford Arch is a bit difficult to see from this angle.

In 1879, this farm was the home of William and Cornelia Crawford. They used irrigation ditches to water their corn and tobacco fields, orchard and vegetable garden.

I took the opportunity to refill my water bottles

I headed back to the other side of the visitor center. It took me a while but finally I found the Archeology Trail. It was a short but steep climb up to a small mesa top. It offered great views but unfortunately the wind was beyond belief! I had to stop and hunker down during the biggest gusts for fear of literally being blown over. Eventually I just headed down instead of exploring further.

Passing by the shuttle parking lot

At the top were ruins of an ancient storage shelter.

A thousand years ago, Ancestral Puebloans prepared and stored food here that they had farmed and gathered in the canyon.

Overlooking the camping areas

Back at the campsite, the baby was crying again. It's sometimes a tough call about these national park campgrounds. The presence of people is often ridiculous: parents screaming, kids yelling, the smell of cigarette smoke, dogs whining and barking, clanking and banging, car alarms, blasting car stereos, honking, more car alarms, diesel trucks running, motorcycles without mufflers, lights, etc. But on the other hand, it's environmentally friendly in that I didn't have to turn on the car once in 48 hours.

Deer were everywhere and were not in the least bit timid.

Evening shadows begin to fall

I sat in the tent resting my tired feet. The wind was whipping around like crazy. Suddenly a huge gust blew my entire tent over... with me in it! It ripped all the stakes right out of the ground! I clambered out to put everything back together. The blowing sand stung my eyes. Dark clouds had start to swirl overhead but fortunately it still remained warm. I feared I was in for a long night.

The ground was so rocky and brittle that the stakes sometimes had a hard time going in. Fortunately there were plenty of large rocks around to help.