The ultimate US ghost towns: exploring ancient Native American settlements and culture, and camping under the stars

Across the Four Corners region in the US are a wealth of ghost towns and rock art that give clues to how the Ancestral Puebloan people lived

The Chaco Culture National Historical Park is also an International Dark Sky Park; a campground allows stays that provide incredible views of the night sky

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Pueblo Bonito at Chaco Culture National Historical Park, New Mexico. A wealth of monuments, ghost towns and rock art left by ancient Native Americans await those who travel across the Four Corners region in the US, where the states of Colorado, Utah, Arizona and New Mexico meet. Photo: Jamie Carter

Published: 5:52pm, 4 Mar 2024Updated: 12:07am, 5 Mar 2024

I descend a wooden ladder leaning against bare rock to reach the canyon ledge and a path along which I pass pinyon pine and Utah juniper. Cottonwoods below me glow yellow in the crisp morning light of late autumn.

Ahead, standing in a sheltered nook in the canyon, is what is left of a village. Between the 8th and 12th centuries, it was home to around 100 people.

Now, only swifts and swallows live here, darting in and out of a rocky canopy over rooms that were used to store corn, beans and squash, and shelters with curved walls, corner windows and T-shaped doorways. Some spaces can be accessed only by a ladder and at the front is a small plaza with sunken circular ceremonial chambers, called kiva.

I have visited similar reminders of ancient civilisations, such as Cambodia’s city of Angkor and Peru’s Machu Picchu, which are integral to their modern country’s sense of identity. This time, I am in a nation with a far less developed sense of its own history: the United States.

The Cliff Palace at Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado. Between the 8th and 12th centuries, it was home to around 100 people. Photo: Jamie Carter

The Cliff Palace is one of more than 600 ancient cliff dwelling sites in Mesa Verde National Park, in southwest Colorado. This is Canyon Country, and across the Four Corners region, where the states of Colorado, Utah, Arizona and New Mexico meet, are a wealth of monuments, ghost towns and rock art left by the Ancestral Puebloan civilisation.

If the Southwestern US makes it onto traveller itineraries, it is typically for Arizona’s Grand Canyon and the mittens, or isolated hills, of Monument Valley. Among the reasons to take a road trip around the US, the ruins of the mysterious Ancestral Puebloan people, also known as Anasazi, hardly figure.

The ultimate US ghost towns: exploring ancient Native American settlements and culture, and camping under the stars

Across the Four Corners region in the US are a wealth of ghost towns and rock art that give clues to how the Ancestral Puebloan people lived The Chaco Culture National Historical Park is also an International Dark Sky Park; a campground allows stays that provide incredible views of the night sky

Across the Four Corners region in the US are a wealth of ghost towns and rock art that give clues to how the Ancestral Puebloan people lived

The Chaco Culture National Historical Park is also an International Dark Sky Park; a campground allows stays that provide incredible views of the night sky