Montezuma Castle National Monument

The second part of our Pink FlaminGoes GTG was in Phoenix. On the way down, we stopped about 50 miles from Flagstaff at the Cliff Castle Casino. We had lunch there and were able to leave the RVs in their parking lot while we went to Montezuma Castle National Monument which is just down the road.

The Southern Sinagua farmers built this five-story, 20 room dwelling sometime between 1100 and 1300. It occupies a cliff recess 100 feet above the valley. Early American settlers mistakenly assumed it was connected to the Aztecs.

The ruins have been preserved and restored to a certain extent.

You can see the filled in areas used to create this smaller storage areas.

There are also more ruins near the valley floor.

This display allows you to see what the inside of the complex would have been like.

It was a very interesting visit. Montezuma Well is also located in the area but we didn't have time to visit it.