IntrepidXJ's Adventure Weblog

Saturday, November 21, 2009

After our fun hike to The Citadel, Amanda and i headed back out Cigarette Springs Road, took a left on UT 261 and made our way down the Moki Dugway. We made a quick stop at Goosenecks State Park since we were in the area.

Then we made our way back towards Bluff. Before heading through Comb Ridge, I decided to take a right onto South Comb Wash Road. I have driven the sections of Comb Wash north of US 163 before, but I had never headed south towards the San Juan River before, and I wanted to see if there was anything cool along this route.

As I suspected, when I got near the San Juan River I came across some of the markers indicating this was part of the Hole in the Rock route.

I followed the markers down a short spur until I reached San Juan Hill, where the road ended anyways.

After heading back to the main road I passed by the remains of a trading post on The Rincone

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October 31, 2009

Since Amanda is in Illinois for the next week, I decided that I would head out to the San Rafael Swell for Halloween this year. I was originally planning on camping and making it a weekend trip, but since a cold front came through earlier this week, I changed my mind and didn’t feel like camping anymore, so I made it a day trip instead

My first destination was a rock art panel that I have been meaning to get to for a while. I’ve driven by and near Black Dragon Canyon a number of times, but this time I would make it a point to check it out.

Pictographs in Black Dragon Canyon (unfortunately at some point in the past, someone thought it was a good idea to outline some of the pictographs in chalk).

After leaving Black Dragon Canyon and following the wash for a little ways, I met up with the Jackass Benches trail and made my way down the spur that used to lead to Sulphur Springs.

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Sunday, October 25, 2009

Sunday morning after some breakfast, we headed northeast out of Vernal on the Jones Hole Road. After a few miles we turned off to follow the Island Park Road to Rainbow Park and Island Park.

Shortly after entering Dinosaur National Monument again, we stopped near McKee Spring to check out a number of petroglyph panels along the road.

The first panel we spotted

A few more hundred feet down the road we hiked up to rock face above the road here. There were a number of petroglyphs here.

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There are a number of rock art panels at this location. However, because of the heat we only made it to the first two. We are planning a trip to head back here in the fall (when it’s cooler) to finish the hikes and to check out a number of other panels in the area that we did not get to yet.

Another small panel located at this site. It’s most likely Fremont.

A few petroglyphs at this site.

There is a short but steep hike up to this panel.

The Kokopelli site is also known as the Canyon Pintado site because this is the main site that was described in the journals of the Escalante Expedition of 1776. The main art here is the figure of Kokopelli, the hump-back flute player of Anasazi mythology.

The first site we stopped at in the Canyon Pintado Historic District was the Waving Hands site.

Around the corner from the rock art we spotted an arch.