Among the earliest inhabitants were the Ancestral Puebloans (the former name for whom, " Anasazi ," has now fallen into disrepute). The remains of their cliff palaces and cities, abandoned around seven hundred years ago, are scattered throughout the region, but their direct descendants, the Pueblo peoples of New Mexico and the Hopi in Arizona, still lead much the same lifestyle, in the same general vicinity.
Less sedentary tribes, such as the Navajo and the Apache , are thought to have migrated into the Southwest from the fourteenth century onwards. They adopted local agricultural and craft techniques and appropriated vast tracts of territory, which they in turn soon had to defend against bands of European immigrants. The first such, in 1540, was a party of Spanish explorers led by Coronado, who spent two years searching for mythical El Dorado-style cities of gold. Sixty years later, Hispanic colonists founded the province of New Mexico , an ill-defined region that covered not only all of the Southwest but much of modern California and Colorado; many of the Catholic missions they established remain intact. Not until 1848 - by which time New Mexico had spent thirty years as a neglected backwater of the newly independent nation of Mexico - was the region forcibly taken over by the United States . Almost immediately, large numbers of outsiders began to pass through on their way to Gold Rush California.
Thereafter, increasingly violent confrontations took place between the US government and the Native Americans. The entire Navajo population was rounded up and forcibly removed to the barren plains of eastern New Mexico in 1864 (though they were soon allowed to return to northeastern Arizona), and the Apache , under warrior chiefs Cochise and Geronimo, fought extended battles with the US cavalry. Though the nominal intention was to open up Indian lands to newly American settlers, few ever succeeded in extracting a living from this harsh terrain.
One exception were the Mormons (or the Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints), whose flight from religious persecution brought them by the late 1840s to the alkaline basin of Utah's Great Salt Lake . Through sheer hard work, and the cooperative management of limited water resources, they established what amounted to an independent country, with outlying communities all over the Southwest. Even here they met with resistance, and until the Civil War intervened, there was a real possibility that the US might declare war on them. They still constitute seventy percent of Utah's population and maintain virtual control of the state's government.
Despite their common heritage, each of the four Southwestern states remains quite distinct. New Mexico bears the most obvious traces of long-term settlement, the Native American pueblos of the north coexisting alongside towns such as Santa Fe, Albuquerque and Taos, which clearly retain their Spanish colonial identity. In Arizona, the history of the Wild West is more conspicuous, in towns such as Tombstone , site of the legendary shoot-out at the OK Corral. Over a third of the state belongs to Native American tribes, such as the Apache, Hopi and Navajo, most of whom live in the red-rock lands of the northeast corner, notably amid the splendor typified by the Canyon de Chelly and Monument Valley .
The canyon country of northern Arizona - even the immense Grand Canyon - won't prepare you for the uninhabited but compelling landscape of southern Utah, where Zion and Bryce canyons are just the best known of a string of national parks and monuments. Moab , poised in the east between majestic Canyonlands and the surreal Arches , has become a top destination for youthful outdoors enthusiasts. Nevada, on the other hand, is nothing short of desolate; gamblers are lured in the millions by the bright lights of Las Vegas , but away from the casinos there's little to see or do.
You can count on warm sunshine anywhere in the Southwest for nine months of the year, with incredible sunsets most evenings. Summer is the peak tourist season, for no good reason - air temperatures topping 100°F can make outdoor life unbearable, while in late summer awesome thunderstorms sweep in without warning, causing flash floods and forest fires. By October, perhaps the best time to come, the crowds are gone and in the mountains and canyons the leaves turn red and gold. Winter brings snow to higher elevations - there's excellent skiing in northern Utah and in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains of New Mexico - while spring sees wild flowers bloom in otherwise barren desert. Note that the climate varies sharply according to elevation, with mountains often 30°F cooler than the plains.
More than almost anywhere in the US, the backcountry wildernesses of the Southwest are ideal for (well-planned) camping and backpacking expeditions. It's vital to be prepared for the harshness of the desert, where even the most basic needs can be hard to fill: always carry water, and if you venture off the beaten track let someone know where you're going and when you'll return.
Unless you have your own vehicle, many of the most fascinating corners of the region are utterly inaccessible. Scheduled public transportation runs almost exclusively between the big cities - which are not at all where you should aim to spend your time.
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