IntrepidXJ's Adventure Blog

Sunday, November 28, 2010

On Sunday Amanda needed to stay home and work on her homework all day, and she wanted me out of the house so that I would not bother her. I decided to hop in the Jeep and head towards Moab so that I could search for some more new rock art and visit some sites I had not been to in a few years. I’m not going to post a long detailed trip report on this one, I’ll just post some pictures I took throughout the day. Enjoy!

Bartlett Pictographs

Intestine Man

Sevenmile Canyon

Birthing Rock

Continue reading

Saturday, November 27, 2010

On Saturday, Amanda and I headed west to the San Rafael Swell so we could go for a hike in Wild Horse Canyon. Before reaching our destination, we stopped by the pictographs along Temple Mountain Wash.

We eventually made our way to Wild Horse Canyon. We hiked up the canyon in search of some more pictographs….which I found high up in an alcove.

Next we scrambled out of the canyon and found the Wild Horse Window (Skylight Arch)

Continue reading

Sunday, November 21, 2010

On Sunday morning we slept in a little later than the previous day. The weather reports had indicated that there would be snow overnight so we were expecting to wake up and find the ground covered, but when I looked out the window there was none. Still, the weather wasn’t the greatest; it was windy and raining off and on. Despite the weather we loaded up the Jeep and headed towards Comb Ridge.

When we reached the trailhead to the Procession Petroglyph Panel, Amanda decided that she wasn’t up for hiking in the wind, sleet and rain, so I headed off on my own while she waited in the Jeep.

The Procession Panel

View from the panel over Comb Ridge

After I made it back to the Jeep we headed through Comb Ridge and made our way south to the San Juan River. Last year when we stopped by the River House Ruins, we did not continue on to the Butler Wash petroglyph panel, so we made our way there.

Butler Wash Petroglyph Panel

There were a ton of petroglyphs all along this section of the cliff, but most of them were pretty badly eroded. Still, it was cool to walk along the cliff and spot them all.

Of course we stopped at the River House (Snake House) ruin again on our way back.

Continue reading

Friday & Saturday, November 19-20, 2010

This last weekend was our annual November trip to the Cedar Mesa / Comb Ridge area. We set out to check out some new ruins and rock art during the weekend and we were not disappointed. On Friday we both got out of work early and headed south to Blanding. On our way we made a quick stop at the Dewey petroglyph panel for a few quick photos before it got dark.

On our way towards Monticello I noticed a nice pink glow over the La Sal Mountains as the sun was setting, so I pulled over to take a quick picture.

Right after I took that photo, the pink glow disappeared.

After dinner in Monticello we finished the drive to Blanding, checked into our hotel (we’re not into cold weather camping) and got to sleep so we could get an early start the next morning.

We were up well before the sun was to rise on Saturday morning and on our way to Cedar Mesa. Our first destination for the day was Road Canyon, and we arrived at the trailhead just after the sun had come up. Here’s a few photos from our hike through Road Canyon…

Fallen Roof Ruin was high on my list of ruins to hike to, so that was our first stop

Fallen Roof

Amanda and I

We continued on down Road Canyon a little further to find a few more ruins.

These ruins had a real ‘fallen roof’

I climbed up to this well preserved granary

Continue reading

You might have noticed that my 30-365 Photo from today was taken of Independence Monument at sunrise this morning. I met my friend Jackson and we started hiking in the dark to catch it as the sun first hit it. While we were there I took a few other photos that I thought I’d share in this post…

Pink clouds before sunrise

Waiting for the sun

Independence Monument

View over the Grand Valley

Jackson

Independence Monument after the sun was up for a bit

It was a cold but fun morning.