Mesa Verde National Park

A road trip to the Four Corners region of the Southwest offers a window into Native American culture, from ruins older than any other man-made structure in the U.S., to glimpses of contemporary life amid the Navajo and Hopi. Named for the spot where the borders of four states — Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Arizona — intersect, the Four Corners region is also home to surreal landscapes like the Painted Desert and Monument Valley.On a recent weeklong trip with my mother and my 14-year-old daughter, we visited some of the area's cultural and historical riches. Here are some highlights.HOPI MESASSome native American sites are best visited with a guide. Our guide to the Hopi reservation, Gary Tso, met us at the Hopi Cultural Center, a museum, hotel and restaurant where the lunch crowd was split between locals and tourists. About 13,000 Hopi live on the reservation in Arizona, entirely surrounded by the Navajo Nation. Tso took us to villages including Old Oraibi, which dates to 1150 and cl...

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