EVAN's SLOTS!!
Disclaimer: Excuse the poor quality pictures. My Rebel XTI was on a setting it should not have been!
To officially kick off our spring break, Even, Gregg Lindsay(well Lindsay sold out) and myself (also Evans wife Janessa and my brother Trevor) decided to do some hiking this week. Evan, acting as our guide, drove to the trailhead. We started the hike at about 9:00 AM. The hike began with a brisk walk across the high desert(near the Ledges Golf Course). We quickly saw signs of development and unfortunately I did not see any survey stakes to pull up (I dont actually do this for it is a crime but the thought of doing pulling them up is a good one!!!). Soon we left the desert and entered a maze of slickrock. As we dropped down into the slickrock Evan pointed out a mini slot canyon. We entered the canyon and at first I wasnt very impressed. It wasnt extremly narrow, nor did it have high cliffs, perhaps only 15 feet to the top. As we hiked further in, me leading, Janessa pointed out some faded petroglyphs that I missed. This was interesting! The petroglyphs appeared to be very old and it was cool that they were in a narrow slot.
We soon left the slot and began to hike across the slickrock. The weathering of the slickrock was very scenic and we often paused in awe at what mother nature had accomplished over thousands of years.
After around 2 miles of easy scrambling we arrived at the end of the trail. Below us was a 500ft or so drop off straight into Snow Canyon State Park. This was the climatic moment of the hike. For several minutes there was not much talking as all the intrepid hikers sat pondering what we saw in front of us. It was a very good, semi spiritual moment.
On the hike back we continued to enjoy the slickrock formations and even had another surprise, another panel of petroglyphs in another slot. This time we had some initial difficulty finding the canyon and also finding an easy way to drop into it, but our perserverance paid off as Janessa found a simple scramble under a ledge of slickrock. This second panel was more well known and sadly more desecrated. People had outlined and colored in the petroglyphs with chalk. While it does make them easier to see know, the long term damage of such is not worth the temporary visual aide.
All and all this was a fun, easy hike with scenic beauty and archeological value!
We soon left the slot and began to hike across the slickrock. The weathering of the slickrock was very scenic and we often paused in awe at what mother nature had accomplished over thousands of years.
After around 2 miles of easy scrambling we arrived at the end of the trail. Below us was a 500ft or so drop off straight into Snow Canyon State Park. This was the climatic moment of the hike. For several minutes there was not much talking as all the intrepid hikers sat pondering what we saw in front of us. It was a very good, semi spiritual moment.
On the hike back we continued to enjoy the slickrock formations and even had another surprise, another panel of petroglyphs in another slot. This time we had some initial difficulty finding the canyon and also finding an easy way to drop into it, but our perserverance paid off as Janessa found a simple scramble under a ledge of slickrock. This second panel was more well known and sadly more desecrated. People had outlined and colored in the petroglyphs with chalk. While it does make them easier to see know, the long term damage of such is not worth the temporary visual aide.
All and all this was a fun, easy hike with scenic beauty and archeological value!
3 comments:
you should try your luck at fishing one of these days.
I SOLD OUT?? Hmmm. Pretty sure I went on the hike the day before hand! I wish I could have come with you guys though! It looks like you had fun!
Matt, I think I was in your education classes at SUU. Anyway, I found your blog looking for images of the Santa Clara River Reserve. I run out there all the time and want to take a little more time to explore. I know there are more petroglyphs than I've seen on the ridge. There are also some on a trail down near the river. Cool blog. I'm discovering the wonders of trail running and spend a lot of time on the Santa Clara/ Ivins side of the county exploring the trails. Hope things are well.
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