Ancient Cultures & Canyons Index

Guided immersion experience journeys
into the heart of the Peoples and the Places.

Other Options:
--Private group explorations
-- Consulting
--Independent traveler option with pre-trip seminar, itinerary planning, CD, reservations with guides

The Colorado Plateau, the second largest plateau in the world, is a place of mysterious beauty. The land is alive with Creation stories exposed in the sinuous canyons which are rugged mountains upside down.   Absorb the unearthly luminous qualities of light on rock and vast plateau lands and of brilliant stars at night.

This is a dreamscape sculpted by elemental forces. Radiant with sun, quickened by lightning, resonant with many millennia of human prayer honoring this sacred earth. The wind that shapes the wondrous formations gives voice to the indwelling spirit that Navajos call Nilchi'i, the inner spirit of humans, the mountains, the stars and all of creation.

This Southwest region has the largest concentration of national monuments, parks and spectacular canyon and mesa landscapes anywhere. This is the mythological landscape of living cultures with roots in another time. With one of the clearest atmospheres in the world, we take time to star and moon gaze and to breathe in the stunning sunset and sunrise colors!

Here imagination is stimulated. Who are we? Why are we here now? Pondering, sensing the mysteries of those who came before, we walk among the remote and exquisitely beautiful remains of stone cliff dwellings, pueblo villages and gaze upon other-worldly images left carved and painted on canyon walls. And, in fact, these ancient peoples are still here.

Hopi, Navajo, Zuni and other Native Peoples warmly welcome you as they share their stories, lives, ways, reverence, earth-spirit ways and arts in homes and villages, around the campfire, and in special backcountry places.

We come together in a warm circle of friends from many nations telling our stories. Legends & earth wisdom woven with historic color, nature, geology, archaeology and real people interactions.

"While it may sound a bit corny to say that our trip with you changed our lives, it certainly has had an impact in so many ways.  In some way I feel liberated from the idea of putting people into categories, seeing people in a particular light. The Hopis especially have broadened our horizons in these respects.  What wonderfully warm, friendly folks they are! They have so little materially but their hearts are bigger than most!  Their way of life, while so different from ours, professes love of family and community and their link to the earth and what she gives to us each day is so refreshing, so real.  We take so much for granted on this planet and when witnessing the way in which the natives revere the tiniest grains of corn, their sustenance, we are brought back to a realisation that in many ways we get our priorities wrong.  They are truly beautiful souls."
Virginia Foley, Toronto, Canada, Jan., 2006

Special Programs

Southwest regional flavors of the land: foods, cultures and circles of celebration...

We create experiences featuring local foods, cultures, songs, stories and circles of sharing to extend this joy to you and to support local food producers. These will feature foods with thousands of years of history with the Hopi people who are masters of the heirloom corn still grown today by dry farming, foods brought to the "New World" by the Spanish, local high desert vineyards/wineries, Navajo traditional foods and Churro sheep, new Santa Fe style Southwest cooking, Chimayo chilis, Taos Pueblo foods and more.

Also here in Sedona are leading edge practitioners of organic raw food cuisine including amazing nutritious-delicious raw chocolate we will introduce you to for your good health and taste bud awakening (plus the local Sedona tradition of drum circles under the full moon). In winter or early spring we will explore some Sonoran desert foods and ecosystems in Southern Arizona. Dates to be announced.

A Yavapai woman grinding wild lemonade berries on metate at a Verde Valley, Arizona gathering

see related article: Agave Roasting: Apache and Puebloan Tradition

Remembering Arizona of an older time...

When trading posts and lodges were important human gathering points. A time when we took more time to absorb by direct experience and listen to the stories. This was a time when people lived closer to the land.

Historical lodges, trading posts, rock art, sections of old Route 66, Native peoples, Grand Canyon north and south rims from perspective of ancient sacred place, Glen Canyon/Colorado River, condor release site and more.

Led by an Arizona native who remembers and misses this slower time of: old time pioneers and cowboys, Navajo peoples coming into town in wagons, who grew up knowing Brighty of the Grand Canyon was a true hero.

see article: Brighty of the Grand Canyon, folklore and images

Hopi Ceremonial Cycle,
information and photos article.