Some parts of the Southwest are desert, and the rest is very dry.
Very little rain falls, but when it does come, it often pours down in short, powerful thunderstorms that cause flash floods. This environment doesn’t seem like a very good place for people, especially for farmers. Yet Native Americans of the Southwest were expert farmers, growing crops of corn, beans, squash, and cotton.
The Hopi were one group of Pueblo people living in the Southwest in 1492. Like some other Pueblo peoples, they lived in multistory buildings or houses on the tops of mesas (high, flat-topped hills) or on the sides of a cliff. Put on your hiking boots and climb the long, winding stone stairway to the top of the mesa. The people of the pueblo are waiting there to meet you.