This is topic Bazillion pics from the weekend... in forum Member forum at The New Huntmastersbbs!.
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Posted by DAA (Member # 11) on April 15, 2011, 03:10 PM:
I went on a long camping, Jeeping, hiking, exploring trip over the weekend. Went to The Maze, which is the part of Canyonlands Nat'l Park that is west of the Colorado river. It's about the least accessible, least visited Nat'l park in the system. Shortest way to get there is 50 miles of dirt each way to the park boundary, and then of course there are no paved roads. A lot of the roads, high clearance and 4WD are not optional, either. Went from there to Grand Gulch for the last day of the trip.
Ended up driving about 250 miles of dirt and hiking almost 40 miles of very rough canyon country over the course of 3 1/2 days. Not counting the other vehicle and two guys I was with, I saw two other vehicles and three other people the whole time. It was GREAT!
I saw a lot of jaw dropping scenery and a lot of neat indian rock art and ruins and artifacts and stuff. Took a BAZILLION pictures. Figured I'd post a bunch of them here ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
.
So, here they come...
First camp site at Chimney Rock:
It was cold as hell the first two days, good opportunity to post a gratuitous Stormy Kromer pic from the first hike, overlooking Water canyon:
This is pretty typical of the hiking in this area, it is ROUGH country:
More to come...
- DAA
Posted by DAA (Member # 11) on April 15, 2011, 03:19 PM:
This big wall is where the first good rock art panel of the trip was found. It's in Pictograph fork, Horse canyon.
The panel is called "The Harvest Scene". Nobody knows how old it is, the experts say anywhere from 2,000 to 8,000 years old. This first pic of it, is "natural", but some of the ones to follow I've tweaked the colors in photoshop to make the rock art show up better:
In this one, you can see why it's called the "Harvest Scene", it looks like rice grass growing out of the guys hand:
Rice grass was one of the staples the ancient ones depended on for survival. It grows all through this canyon country. Here is a picture of some growing not 50 feet from the above rock art panel:
More to come...
- DAA
[ April 15, 2011, 03:21 PM: Message edited by: DAA ]
Posted by DAA (Member # 11) on April 15, 2011, 03:28 PM:
Just some scenery and hiking pics:
A couple of the arches we hiked to, first Beehive arch:
And Whitmore arch, firs from the front, then from the back:
More coming...
- DAA
Posted by jimanaz (Member # 3689) on April 15, 2011, 03:34 PM:
These pics are awesome Dave and got me thinking. Now would you please remind me what the name of this place is, cuz I know you know, lol.
Thanks, in advance!
Posted by DAA (Member # 11) on April 15, 2011, 03:47 PM:
I've mentioned how rough the hiking is around this area. In a few spots, there is real exposure - if you slip and fall, you're gonna get hurt bad, or die.
One hike we took, was particularly rough. We were looking for a little known rock art panel. We thought we knew which canyon it was in, but not exactly where. In the process of searching for the rock art, we took some pretty sketchy routes. No exagerating, in some spots, slip, or even just miss place your step by six inches, and you would die of a heart attack before you hit the bottom. Hugging along an eyebrow of sandstone 10 inches wide on the face of a cliff with a thousand foot drop below.
This is Randy on one of the levels I searched and found nothing. It's kind of hard to tell in the picture, but that shelf between me and him is pretty narrow and if you fall off it, you are probably going to die. Randy ended up staying where he was instead of following me. I searched out the level until it dead ended but found nothing:
We scaled walls and scrambled down talus slopes and friction pitched up boulders with tons of exposure and searched levels and kept coming up empty.
So... We were DAMN glad, when my buddy Jared finally spotted the panel we were looking for. Getting to it was still pretty rough, and not entirely safe or smart to do, but we made it.
Here is our first glimpse of the panel - it's on the big blank cliff face below:
This is a very little known panel. Almost nobody even knows it exists and it's difficult and dangerous to get to even once you know where it is. You guys are some of the first people to ever see pictures of it. We were STOKED to locate it!
More coming...
- DAA
Posted by DAA (Member # 11) on April 15, 2011, 03:49 PM:
Jim, that's Newspaper Rock. One of the half dozen or so Newspaper Rock's in that part of the country .
Next time you are there, keep driving another half mile and walk up the next canyon. Way more cooler rock art up there and no fences or other folks to bother you ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
.
- DAA
Posted by DAA (Member # 11) on April 15, 2011, 03:58 PM:
Rock art wasn't the only thing we saw on our hikes. We also saw some stone tools and potsherds and the like laying around. Here are just a few pictures of some of that stuff:
A gorgeous little point:
Couple of corrugated potsherds:
A nice white on black decorated potsherd:
And, more rock art .
This one was pretty cool, found it in a most unusual spot for rock art, inside a wind and water hollowed out boulder in the middle of a pinion/juniper forrest at high elevation:
More coming...
- DAA
Posted by jimanaz (Member # 3689) on April 15, 2011, 03:58 PM:
Thanks, I'll keep that in mine come Sept.
Again, great pics! Thanks for sharing this stuff.
Posted by DAA (Member # 11) on April 15, 2011, 04:04 PM:
And of course, we also saw plenty of Anasazi ruins. Here's some pics of those, along with a few more pictures of the hiking it took to get to these places.
Just a little bit more to come!
- DAA
Posted by DAA (Member # 11) on April 15, 2011, 04:15 PM:
This was my favorite ruin on this trip. It's pretty unusual to find one with the roof still this intact:
And a picture of the inside of the roof:
Those cords holding it together made from yucca fiber are 800 years old!!
Last hiking picture:
And last series of rock art pics:
Hope y'all aren't bored too much with this stuff. But at least it will be a few weeks before I get out again and you might have to see more of it...
- DAA
[ April 15, 2011, 04:17 PM: Message edited by: DAA ]
Posted by Leonard (Member # 2) on April 15, 2011, 04:48 PM:
That's wonderful stuff, Dave. Damn, wish I was there. I absolutely love that shit. That shard you called corrugated, they make it by rolling in the palms into long snakes and then carefully winding the pieces and pinching them in place, in circles until they get the height they are looking for. That method predates pottery wheels, very ancient way to make pots. Those pots usually had round bottoms, rather than flat because they were so much easier to place in a dirt floor than one that was flat.
That projectile point is excellent. As you probably know, actual "arrowheads" were really small, otherwise they wouldn't fly worth a damn. So, most of the points that are an inch and a half and larger were probably used as lances and spears.
Thank you for taking the time to post these photographs. They are excellent and I think the members really appreciate the beauty and your effort. To my way of thinking, it's incredible awesome stuff, I am very interested in artifacts and petrogliphs, (hmm, my spellchecker doesn't recognize the word and it's probably misspelled?)
GH/LB
Posted by TOM64 (Member # 561) on April 15, 2011, 06:17 PM:
I love the pics. Around here we find a few arrowheads and such but the only artwork we see is
CASINO!
Again I love the pics.
Posted by the bearhunter (Member # 3552) on April 15, 2011, 06:18 PM:
most excellent Dave. i'm jelous as hell.
Posted by Cdog911 (Member # 7) on April 15, 2011, 06:47 PM:
Definitely enjoy this stuff. WE used to find lotsa pottery like that around my uncle's place. He said when he was a kid, his mother had amassed a gunny sack full of arrow heads from their property. Their family made a rule that no other artifacts are to be removed from the site. But, as an exception, last time we were there, my daughter found what my uncle described as a special and uncommon find, as far as pottery goes. It was a shard, but it was a uniquely Anasazi form of potting where the edge showed white on the inner and outer surfaces,and a black layer in between. I guess someone in CO just recently figured out how to fire a pot to get that pattern.
Beautiful country. You have to hand it to those ancient people for their use of the technology they had on hand to affect their survival in such rugged and desolate country. Those dwellings are too cool.
Posted by Kelly Jackson (Member # 977) on April 15, 2011, 07:56 PM:
Way cool DAA. Thank you for posting them.
Posted by tlbradford (Member # 1232) on April 15, 2011, 08:14 PM:
These photos are awesome. Thanks for taking the time to post these.
Posted by Kokopelli (Member # 633) on April 15, 2011, 08:21 PM:
Love it...............Thanx!!!!!!
Posted by 4949shooter (Member # 3530) on April 16, 2011, 04:38 AM:
Good pics..
What kind of heat were you packin' out there?
Posted by DAA (Member # 11) on April 16, 2011, 07:14 AM:
Had my .357 in the Jeep, just 'cuz. Never carry it hiking though, just be dead weight.
- DAA
Posted by sparkyibewlocal440 (Member # 397) on April 16, 2011, 07:48 AM:
Most excellent stuff Dave, thanks for posting, looking forward to more.
I saw a few drawings of snakes, did you see any?
Sounds like a good place to bring some rope and a few pieces of pro along?
Posted by Nikonut (Member # 188) on April 16, 2011, 08:30 AM:
Great pics Dave!!!
You are blessed to be able to go there and do that... one can only imagine what living there 1000years ago must have been like.
Thanks for sharing!!!
Nikonut
Posted by DAA (Member # 11) on April 16, 2011, 08:55 AM:
Gary, I do always carry some rope, it didn't get used this time, but a couple times it was close.
Saw a few snakes, two rattlers and a gopher. Usually see more when the weather is warmer.
- DAA
Posted by knockemdown (Member # 3588) on April 16, 2011, 01:38 PM:
Thoroughly awe inspiring, Dave!
Thank you!!!
Posted by Jay Nistetter (Member # 140) on April 16, 2011, 08:22 PM:
Those are fantastic!
I wonder what the deal is with the headless spacemen?
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