Several tours explore these ancient ruins (puyecliffdwellings.com), 5 miles west of the Santa Clara Pueblo at the entrance to Santa Clara Canyon. Abandoned around 1500, they’re similar in style to those at Bandelier National Monument. The most impressive are sculpted into the cliffside, with the rest freestanding on the mesa-top above. The big appeal is that the pueblo guides who show you around are directly descended from their original inhabitants, thus providing an actual connection with the vanished past.
From the visitor center, a former Harvey House, Pueblo guides take you to the top of the mesa to see strikingly in-tact adobe-brick ruins that were home to between 1500 and 3500 people from 900 CE. Homes were two or three stories tall and didn't have doorways to protect against invaders (they used ladders to get in). Then, walk down the mountain along an ancient trail (or take a shuttle) to see cliff dwellings and petroglyphs. Guided tours are mandatory and last from 30 minutes to two hours depending on where you go.
