IntrepidXJ's Adventure Blog

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

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Thursday, November 11, 2010

Amanda and I were both off on Veterans Day this year so we loaded up the Jeep and headed for Canyonland’s Island in the Sky District for the day. On our way there we stopped to check out some petroglyphs and pictographs.

Intestine Man pictograph panel

Before reaching Canyonlands, we took a side road to scout Marlboro Point for a future sunrise photo.

Crows Head Spire

When we reached Canyonlands we headed straight for Aztek Butte.

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Saturday, November 6, 2010

If you haven’t noticed, I’ve sort of been in a rock art mood lately. I figured I would keep in the rock art mood by heading over to the San Rafael Swell to check out a few of the rock art sites I have missed in the past.

Morning along Cottonwood Road

Bottleneck Peak

Even though I’ve stopped at the Buckhorn Wash Pictographs plenty of times before, I took a few drive-by photos as I passed them.

A little further up the Buckhorn Draw Road I parked off to the side of the road and hiked up to Ruin Arch.

Ruin Arch…if you look closely you can see two petroglyphs inside the arch

Close-up of the petroglyphs

It’s a cool arch that is easy to miss when driving by on the road below unless you are looking for it

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Sunday, October 31, 2010 (Halloween)

On Sunday I was on my own again and didn’t want to get too far from home. I decided to head over into Utah to do some more exploring around the Yellow Cat and Highlands areas just north of Arches National Park. I started out by checking out a few trails around Lost Spring Canyon before making my way over to Winter Camp Ridge. In the spring I had started to look for a short slot canyon in the area, but didn’t have the time to complete the search. This time I knew exactly where I was going and took the short hike down into the Winter Camp slot canyon.

Different color on each wall of the slot

After finishing up the hike I had a quick lunch and then headed north towards the Book Cliffs.

View across Sagers Flat with the La Sal Mountains in the background

It seems that I end up visiting the Sego Canyon pictographs and petroglyphs about once a year, so I figured I would keep up the tradition…

Some Barrier style pictographs

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Saturday, October 30, 2010

On Saturday morning my friend Jackson and I headed to Green River and then south through the San Rafael Desert to the trailhead for Horseshoe Canyon (formerly Barrier Canyon). I have wanted to hike this canyon for a while to check out all of the pictographs, so I was excited to finally be there. The hike turned out to be just under 8 miles long after all of the side trips we took, and the weather was just about perfect. Here’s some photos of the pictographs we checked out along the way.

Our first stop was at the High Gallery

Then we stopped at the Horseshoe Gallery

Up next was the Alcove Gallery which was in a huge alcove. Unfortunately these pictographs were either worn off pretty good or vandalized.

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