Sand Island Petroglyph Panel, Utah

The San Juan River at Sand Island.

On a cold January afternoon I stopped by for another visit to the BLM's Sand Island Recreation Area.

Picnic tables and shade shelters overlooking the San Juan River.

 There is a boat landing there on the San Juan River, a campground (self register and pay, year around) and picnic areas with vault toilets, and a BLM (Bureau of Land Management) ranger station (not open in the winter).

The campground has two loops. A small one with a few sites just to the east of the ranger station, and a much larger loop at the west end.

Interpretive sign for the Sand Island Petroglyph Panel, on the cliff face in the background.

 It is along the road into and through the west campground loop that the Sand Island Petroglyph Panel is located. An exceptional collection of ancient inscriptions pecked into the patina of the sandstone cliff there. The main panel is protected by a chain link fence, with an easy trail along it so that you can ogle the many figures and photograph them without touching them.

Petroglyphs etched into the sandstone cliff face. Notice rider on horse, which would be later than prehistoric.

 Most of the petroglyphs (pecked into the rock, as opposed to pictographs, which are painted on the rock) are prehistoric, up to probably a couple of thousand years old. They were made by what today are referred to as the Ancestral Puebloan culture. There are also a few that must have been made after the 1600s, when the first Spanish explorers introduced the horse to the natives in North America.

Inscriptions of unknown meaning. But this must have been an important location, with so many of them.

 Photo location: Sand Island Recreation Area, southern San Juan County between Bluff and Mexican Hat, Utah.

See much more of my photography on my website at www.NaturalMoment.com. 

© Copyright 2017 Stephen J. Krieg

Petroglyphs and Amphibians at Kachina Natural Bridge

Down the trail to Kachina Natural Bridge.

Natural Bridges National Monument is hot in the summertime, despite being at an elevation of 6,500 feet on the mesa top. All that bare Cedar Mesa Sandstone and little shade.

Ancient symbols and stone tool sharpening grooves high on the southeast buttress of Kachina Bridge.

 Nevertheless I hiked once again down to Kachina Bridge. I'd heard from visitors that there were what sounded like salamander nymphs swimming about in one of the residual pools near the bridge.  I wanted to check that out myself.

NPS archaeology crew at work on Kachina Bridge.

When I got down to the Bridge, the National Park Service archaeology crew -- three of which are Hopi -- was at work. They were cleaning some modern graffiti that had accumulated on the southeast bridge abutment. Some of the graffiti was quite high -- probably put there at a time when the unpredictable flash floods had left a high sand bank that allowed people to walk up to the ledge where most of the ancient petroglyphs (figures pecked into the stone) and pictographs (painted onto the stone) exist. The symbols are prehistoric, left there by the Ancestral Puebloans long ago. And over a long period of time.

Being underneath the massive natural bridge is always pleasant. Besides the ample shade, the yawning opening of the bridge usually provides a kind of breezeway effect to make it feel even more comfortable. 

After talking with the crew for a while, I went amphibian hunting. It didn't take long. The pool of water nearby the bridge -- the mouth of Armstrong Canyon where it enters White Canyon -- was still deep enough for what seem to be salamander larvae, probably Tiger Salamanders, Ambystoma tigrinum. They had twin pairs of gills on each side, long tails, and legs.

Salamander larvae in canyon pool near Kachina Natural Bridge.

Tiger Salamander larva in the canyon pool.

Then it was time for the sweaty hike back out of the canyon. Good, worthwhile exercise on a warm summer day in southeast Utah.

Photo location: Natural Bridges National Monument, San Juan County, southeast Utah.

© Copyright 2016 Stephen J. Krieg

Art Of Ancients: Newspaper Rock, Utah

Newspaper Rock, Utah.

Returning to the Needles district of Canyonlands National Park in southeast Utah, it's hard not to stop by Newspaper Rock again on the way in.

I hate the name. To label a spectacular signpost of ancient native petroglyphs (figures pecked into the rock's surface) a "newspaper", as if they were mass published daily editions, is stupid.

The artwork, meanwhile, is world class heritage stuff. And on this day it was a rare rainy day in the canyon country high desert, which meant soft light on N--Rock.

"Newspaper" Rock artwork panorama.

And the rains had the greenery sprouted at the base of the sandstone lens that had been such a prominent place to signify--whatever it was they meant. Because they had no written language. So we don't really know what they meant. Their descendants in the modern pueblo tribes of New Mexico and Arizona know a lot. But not all. Anyway, they keep a lot of it secret.

So I stood and examined, stared, photographed once again. Most of the rock-pecked figures are quite bright, indicating relative newness. The ones with a horse or wheel are really new, since the horse wasn't introduced until the 1600s by the Spanish. Because of that indicator, most of these seem to be of that era. Not that weathered.

A couple more pondering: why so many bare feet? Why not hands instead?

The demon or monster like beings are a whole other story. Space aliens? Dreams or hallucinogenic visions?

Older rock art amid the cracks.

Much less spectacular, and maybe more revealing, are the older figures. Weathered, seemingly lower and off to the side. Toward the cracks. I think the most important stuff's there. Whatever it means.

© 2015 Stephen J. Krieg