IntrepidXJ's Adventure Blog

May 14-15, 2011

The continuation from Set 1, Set 2 and Set 3 of my Nine Mile Canyon rock art photos…

Four Legs Panel

The figure in the upper right hand corner appears to have 4 legs!

Fading Snake

Amanda spotted this fading white snake along the way.

Wavy Line

A small panel with a wavy line through it.

Spirals & Snakes

Spiral Horned-Snake

One of my favorite horned snakes that we came across this weekend.

Family Panel

The Family Panel, another well known site in Nine Mile.

Devils Playground Sheep

A high panel up in Devils Canyon near the remains of a granary. The large big horn sheep and elk on the left are pretty cool.

Triangle Men

A number of anthropomorphic figures with triangle-shaped torsos.

Basketmaker Panel

Some experts consider the large figure in this panel to be a ‘Basketmaker’ figure.

Franks Circles

The last site we visited near the mouth of North Franks Canyon on Saturday before turning around and heading back to camp for a late dinner….it was starting to get pretty dark out at the last few panels we visited…

Stay tuned for one more set of photos taken on Sunday before we headed home.

May 14-15, 2011

The continuation from Set 1 and Set 2 of my Nine Mile Canyon rock art photos…

Daddy Canyon Petroglyphs

A small panel found a little ways up Daddy Canyon consisting of an anthropomorph and a few bighorn sheep.

Rainbow Elk

After exploring Daddy Canyon we hiked back towards Rasmussen Cave. We found this petroglyph panel along the way with a very detailed elk figure under a rainbow.

No Tresspassing

Of course, no Nine Mile Canyon photo collection is complete without a photo of this vandalized, complete with misspelling, pictograph in Rasmussen Cave….

The Wizard

This small petroglyph panel has a figure in the middle that appears to be wearing a horned headdress and a long flowing cloak.

A Great Hunting Scene

Here’s a closeup of The Great Hunt Panel, probably one of the most famous petroglyph panels found in the Nine Mile Canyon area.

Cottonwood Hunt

A wider view of The Great Hunt Panel.

Spiral Sheep Slab

A couple of petroglyphs next to the Big Buffalo.

Big Buffalo

The Big Buffalo Panel at the confluence of Nine Mile Canyon and Cottonwood Canyon. The panel was glowing in the late afternoon sunlight when I was there for this photo.

Spiral Tail Panel

This panel, near The Great Hunt, features a bighorn sheep that has a large spiral tail.

Centipede Panel

A busy panel across from the mouth of Cottonwood Canyon.

White Snake Alcove

This large alcove, located high above the road, contains a few painted white snakes.

Even more photos from Nine Mile Canyon to come…

May 14-15, 2011

Here’s the continuation from Set 1 of my Nine Mile Canyon rock art photos.

Parallel Snake

A good sized snake petroglyph off all by itself.

Sandhill Crane Site

The famous Sand Hill Crane petroglyph panel.

Horned Shield Site

Another site consisting of a dot matrix, snake and some shield-like figures with horns.

Petroglyph Wall

A canyon wall just covered in petroglyphs.

Outlines

The outlines of two figures, one much larger than the other.

The anthropomorph in the middle of this petroglyph panel found in Daddy Canyon looks like he’s juggling to me.

Daddy Canyon Eagle Man

This figure in Daddy Canyon appears to be wearing a large headdress.

Long Line

A long line of sheep and elk.

Elk on Dots

Mickey Mouse

The petroglyph on the left reminds me of a head with Mickey Mouse ears on…

Still more photos from Nine Mile Canyon to come…

May 14-15, 2011

I’ve wanted to get back to Nine Mile Canyon for quite a while. The last time I was there was in 2007 and I kind of rushed through the canyon on my way elsewhere, so I missed a lot. I had wanted to go to Nine Mile Canyon back in November or December, but the weather prevented me from doing so. Then I planned on going in March, but that never worked out either. Finally, this weekend Amanda and I were able to spend the weekend there searching out many panels of rock art!

We left bright and early on Saturday morning and made a quick stop in Wellington to top off my fuel tank before making our way into the canyon. Our first stop was at the Nine Mile Ranch so that we could setup camp before starting our search. After leaving the ranch we spent the rest of Saturday and much of Sunday searching the canyon for rock art and taking many photos. Unfortunately, many of the rock art panels are located on private property and you can only take photos from the road. Luckily I had my 100-400mm lens with me, so I was able to get decent photos of most of the panels we found. We managed to find well over 50 different rock art sites, many which contained multiple panels….and I’m sure there are a ton more that we missed. I’m looking forward to getting back and finding many more in the future!

Since I took so many photos on this trip, I’m going to break this report up into a few sections with plenty of pictures…so enjoy! I’ll try to keep them in the order I took them.

Long-Necked Sheep Panel

An overview of the Long-Necked Sheep Panel.

Long-Necked Sheep

A close-up look at the Long-Necked Sheep….a very interesting petroglyph.

Ladder Man

An interesting anthromorph that is part of the Long-Necked Sheep Panel.

Another Long-Necked Sheep

The right side of the panel with another long-necked sheep.

Cheer Leaders

These figures remind me of cheer leaders….though they are probably holding shields.

Leading A Horse to Water

A man leading a horse with a rider.

Colorful Faded Figure

Located alone on a boulder near the balanced rock, this anthropomorph is fading away but on a colorful section of the rock.

Another Hunting Scene

Hunting scenes are common in petroglyphs, this one has a figure with a bow and arrow in the middle.

Decorated Torsos

A line of decorated pictographs.

Staring Sheep

More photos to come…

Saturday, March 26, 2011

On Saturday, Jackson and I headed into Utah so that I could check on a geocache I hid last summer. After checking on the cache, we hiked around the rim of the canyon nearby.

Wavy Sandstone

After some more hiking around and on Jug Rock, we headed north to the Book Cliffs in search of some petroglyphs….specifically The Butterfly, or bat, petroglyph. I had an idea on where it was located, but not an exact location. We searched the area for a little bit and managed to find it.

The Butterfly

After finding The Butterfly, we searched the nearby boulders and found a bunch of other petroglyphs.

Book Cliff Boulder

There was a small crack between two large boulders that I squeezed into, and inside there were a bunch of petroglyphs…

In the Crack

Sheep in the Crack

Another Hand

Lichen & Faint Spiral

Another look at a boulder with many petroglyphs on it….

Book Cliff Boulder 2

When we were done searching the area I took Jackson over to the Sego Rock Art Site, since he had never been there. I’ve been here numerous times before, but not since I got my new camera, so I took a few photos while we were there.

Sego Canyon Pictographs

Sego Snake Man

We searched the area and managed to find a petroglyph of a sheep I had not seen before.

Sego Sheep

Sego Snake

Fremont petroglyphs over faint Barrier Canyon Style pictographs. Look closely above the petroglyphs…

Fremont Over Barrier

Sego Ute Shield

We had plans to find some more pictographs, and I headed to the area they were supposed to be in…..unfortunately, I took the long way and by the time we got there we had run out of time and had to head home. I know I will be returning to the Book Cliffs in search of more rock art this year 🙂