Program Registration/Orientation and Introductions/Navajo Silversmithing

Afternoon: Drop-in registration from 4:30 - 5:15 PM, conference room. Note:The Navajo Nation observes Mountain Daylight Time, but the rest of Arizona does not. (During daylight savings, the time on the Navajo Nation is one hour later than the time in the rest of AZ.)

Dinner: Dinner will be served in the Holiday Inn Garcia's Restaurant. Dinner will include a nightly selection of entrees (some with a southwestern flare), a trip through the salad bar and dessert.

Evening: After dinner, your program coordinator provides a program orientation. Participant introductions follow. Hear a presentation on consumer tips for buyers of native crafted jewelry and see a silversmithing demonstration.

Lodging: Canyon de Chelly / Chinle Holiday Inn

Meals Included: Dinner

Explore Canyon de Chelly's South Rim/Canyon Archaeology/Navajo Clanship and Ceremonies

Note: South Rim tour makes numerous stops to go to viewpoints up to 1/4 mile away. Trails can be uneven and rocky.

Breakfast: Enjoy a breakfast buffet at Garcia's, the hotel restaurant.The buffet includes, on alternating days: 2 types of eggs; pancakes or biscuits & gravy; corned beef hash or bacon/sausage; cream of wheat, whole/cut fruit, cereal.

Morning: Visit the Canyon de Chelly National Monument Visitor Center’s excellent exhibits and bookstore with numerous titles on Native American topics. Then take the guided tour of the canyon's South Rim with a Navajo guide. Stops will be made at overlooks including well-known Spider Rock. This rock formation of de Chelly sandstone figures prominently in Navajo cosmology. From the rim you will have the opportunity to view the farms, pastures and hogans in the canyon below as well as ruins once inhabited by ancestral puebloans.

Lunch: Enjoy a traditional Navajo lunch buffet at the hotel restaurant. Navajo Tacos, Posole (hominy) soup, steamed vegetables, blue corn mush, and vegetable soup and more will be offered.

Afternoon: Hear about recent archaeological discoveries and current excavation techniques in Canyon de Chelly with archaeologists from the National Park Service. Echoes of the past exist all around the region and now is the time to hear from an expert about their known origin.

Dinner: Dinner will be served in the Holiday Inn Garcia's Restaurant. Dinner will include a nightly selection of entrees (some with a southwestern flare), a trip through the salad bar and dessert.

Evening: Enjoy a presentation on Navajo clanship and ceremonies. The clanship system provides the fabric for life on the reservation giving cultural instruction from birth to death on matters of significance. Discuss a few of the ceremonies of most importance and how transformational periods of one's life are addressed within the family and clan.

Lodging: Canyon de Chelly / Chinle Holiday Inn

Meals Included: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

Navajo Long Walk/Canyon Rock Art/Canyon de Chelly Jeep Excursion/Navajo Entertainment

Note: Jeep tour is in large 4-wheel drive jeep which holds about a dozen people. Road is sometimes bumpy and crosses numerous washes. Stops are made along the way, with short walks, which are often sandy, to sites of interest.

Breakfast: Enjoy a breakfast buffet at Garcia's, the hotel restaurant.The buffet includes, on alternating days: 2 types of eggs; pancakes or biscuits & gravy; corned beef hash or bacon/sausage; cream of wheat, whole/cut fruit, cereal.

Morning: Hear about the Navajo Long Walk from Canyon de Chelly to Fort Sumner, New Mexico. This walk represents a seminal event in the cultural consciousness of the Navajo people and may be likened to the Cherokee Trail of Tears. Then learn about Canyon de Chelly's rock art. The presenter is an archaeologist with the National Park Service.

Lunch: Lunch at Garcia's, the hotel restaurant.

Afternoon: After lunch, travel a short distance to the well-known Thunderbird Lodge where the 4-wheel drive tour trucks for the "jeep" trip into Canyon de Chelly with certified Navajo guides. Travel into the canyon on this afternoon's tour of Canyon de Chelly and Canyon del Muerto's ruins, sandstone cliffs and side canyons, rock art and stunning scenery. Highlights include Antelope House, White House Ruin and the Standing Cow pictograph. While in the Canyon you may see hogans, cornfields and livestock as Navajo families continue to maintain homesteads inside the Canyon. The canyon's unparalleled setting of sheer-walled and desert varnish-stained cliffs framed by the tranquil canyon bottom and a peerless blue sky provides a stunning backdrop for this unforgettable journey.

Dinner: Dinner will be served in the Holiday Inn Garcia's Restaurant.

Evening: An evening of Navajo entertainment. Your performer, William Yazzie, has been delighting Road Scholar participants for many many years and loves to share his passion for Navajo music, culture, and dance.

Lodging: Canyon de Chelly / Chinle Holiday Inn

Meals Included: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

Breakfast: Enjoy a breakfast buffet at Garcia's, the hotel restaurant.

Morning: Living on the reservation presents inherent challenges. Learn about some of the common and not so common issues facing the Navajo and current efforts to confront them. Program ends by 10:30 AM. Hotel checkout by 11:00 AM.

Meals Included: Breakfast