Near the point in Snake Gulch where we turned around and headed back up canyon, we came across a large alcove that had the highest concentration of pictographs we had come across all day. Many of them were still in great condition and some of the largest ones we had seen that day. This is a look up into part of the large alcove with a few of the larger anthropomorphs.
>> Snake Gulch
The last long hike we had planned for our Arizona Strip trip was into Snake Gulch. This turned out to be a long hike at about fifteen miles, but the terrain was relatively flat so it was a pretty easy hike. Along the way there are a lot of pictographs to find. Many of them are badly faded and weathered, but there are some that are in great condition, too. Watching the walls for rock art and stopping to photograph them made this hike an all day affair for us. We actually missed this pair of pictographs on our way down-canyon, but luckily we spotted them on our way back up-canyon to camp.
>> Snake Gulch
The Big Man Panel is a large Basketmaker pictograph panel found within Grand Gulch. The largest two figures found on the panel are the Big Man and Big Woman. This photo is a closer view of the Big Man.
I spent Memorial Day weekend exploring some new canyons of Cedar Mesa in search of ruins and rock art. One of those canyons was Fish Creek Canyon where I found this well-preserved set of reverse-handprints just above a large ruin. It was a great weekend of hiking and exploring!
Here’s a portion of an amazing Basketmaker petroglyph panel located along the San Juan River near Butler Wash and known as the Shamans Panel. Currently, this is probably the best portion of the panel, however, if you walk along the cliff face you will find hundreds, if not thousands, of other petroglyphs in this same area. Unfortunately, a lot of the other petroglyphs are very faint and hard to see and photograph. This area must have been very important in the past.
