New Mexico
September 22 - 29, 2022
Featuring Museum Curator Lucy Fowler Williams

New Mexico

Blending the best in cultural and natural wonders into one trip, dive deep into the Puebloan history that stretches back over 1,000 years, including visits to some of the best-preserved ancient architecture in the world. We start our tour in the southwest corner of Colorado at Mesa Verde National Park, a World Heritage Site and home of over 500 cliff dwellings, including Cliff Palace, a magnificent structure of over 110 rooms. We will then spend time in Chaco Culture National Historical Park, another World Heritage Site, to immerse ourselves in the history and mystery of why these huge greathouse structure were located in this remote canyon. A full day in Canyon de Chelly will take you 15 miles into the park on a 4-wheel drive tour with a Navajo guide sharing insight into life in the canyon from the past to the present. Our exploration continues with time at Hubbell Trading Post, which has been active since 1878, a brief visit to the center of the Navajo Nation at Window Rock, El Morro National Monument with its famous inscriptions and beautiful trails, and finally to Acoma Pueblo also known as the “Sky City”, a National Trust Historical Site and current home of the descendants of the earliest inhabitants of the Southwest.

Faculty Host

Lucy Fowler Williams

Lucy Fowler Williams is Associate Curator and Senior Keeper of American Collections of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology (Penn Museum). A cultural anthropologist, she received her Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania and her M.A. from the University of New Mexico. Before coming to Penn she worked at the Indian Arts Research Center of the School of American Research in Santa Fe, and completed internships at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. Her dissertation, Contemporary Tewa Identities in Cloth: Embodiment, Persistence and Renewal in the Upper Rio Grande Valley, New Mexico involved collaborative research methodologies, which she continues to engage with. She has received grants and fellowships from the National Endowment of the Arts, the School of American Research, the Institute of Museum and Library Services, and the Penn Museum. Among her projects, she wrote the Guide to the Ethnographic Collections of the Penn Museum (2003), co-edited Native American Voices on Identity, Art and Culture: Objects of Everlasting Esteem (2005), developed the online Louis Shotridge Digital Archive (2011), and curated the ongoing Penn Museum exhibition, Native American Voices: The People - Here and Now, which opened in 2014. Her research interests include issues surrounding indigenous identity, histories of collecting and representation, material culture, and textiles of the Americas.

 

Travel Insurance
We encourage all Penn Alumni travelers to select the travel insurance that is right for you.
Penn Libraries Reading List
The reading list compiled specially for this program from the Penn Libraries will be available soon.
ITINERARY

Day 1 Arrive in Durango 
Day 2 Mesa Verde National Park
Day 3 Chaco Culture National Park
Day 4 Canyon de Chelly National Monument
Day 5 Four-Wheel Excursion in Canyon de Chelly 
Day 6 Hubbell Trading Post & El Morro National Monument
Day 7 Acoma Pueblo & Albuquerque 
Day 8 Departures Home


For detailed weather information as your departure date approaches, we suggest you consult http://www.weather.com/.  


Participation in tour packages by The Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania (“UPenn”), through its Penn Alumni Travel program, is limited solely to educational sponsorship of the tour. UPenn is not affiliated with the third party tour operators (“Tour Operators”) that operate and manage the tours advertised here. UPenn disclaims any responsibility or liability for any acts or omissions of the Tour Operators.