Holbrook's Petroglyph Park

Yesterday: Geocaching at the Rock Pile

This continues the documentation of our recent trip to the Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona.

We used a quarter of a tank of gas looking for the road to get us to the next geocache, and were just about to give up when I saw a road next to the Interstate offramp and took it.  We knew we were looking for the road that would take us to the city golf course, and this wasn't the right road either, but when we got to the top of the hill we saw a sign on the Interestate telling us that to get to the golf course we had to take a certain exit from the Interstate.  Then it was a matter of getting back on the Interstate and taking that exit.

The exit takes you quit a way out of the city of Holbrook, but the property here is owned by the city.  It's a very winding road around the base of bluff, and then to get the petroglyph park you have to pass the golf course itself.

The geocache site is somewhere in the area circled in red in the northwest quadrant of this Google Earth screenshot.

Anyway, the roads are rough and poorly maintained, and you feel like you've gone too far just about the time you actually reach the "park."

This doesn't look much like a road to a city park, does it?

A small and easy-to-miss warning sign near the entrance to the park.  It says:

ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK.
STAY ON THE PATH.
DO NOT TOUCH THE
PETROGLYPH'S [sic].
WATCH YOUR STEP.
THE PATH MAY HAVE
SOME LOOSE ROCKS.
PLEASE BE CAREFUL.

After the rest of the warning, is "please be careful" really necessary?

Yes, that is a large petrified wood stump next to the sign.

The area is also rangeland, so it was gated with a little wire twist being the only thing keeping the gate closed.  The sign on the gate just said to close the gate after you, so we figured it was okay to enter.

We found the cache pretty quickly, and then just explored a little and took pictures of the glyphs, which were pretty impressive.

There are quite a few petroglyphs at ground level here, but there are some very clear and interesting ones much higher up the crumbling bluff.  Strix wasn't quite adventurous enough to accompany me, but I climbed the steep rocks to get a closer look.  This shot is of Strix waiting for me below.

Some of the petroglyphs I was able to shoot from my higher vantage point.

Strix took these shots.  The one on the right shows me at the top of the climb.

The left is another shot of Strix from where I was.  The right is a shot out to the horizon.  The itty bitty blue dot in the center is Strix's PT Cruiser.

These rocks are as hard to climb as they look like they would be, which I'm guessing is why there was a warning sign advising me not to do so.  Don't try this at home.  The only part of the warning sign I followed was to not touch the petroglyphs (which of course, you should never do).

A wooden plank thrown across a dry arroyo.  This is state-of-the-art park engineering.  Of course, the purpose of the park is probably more to preserve the petroglyphs than to provide a nice place for people to hang out.

I just took these because I found the landscape interesting.  It amazes me to think that people actually lived here.

Here's a picnic area, in case you forgot that this is a park.  Oh, you'll have to machete your way through the tumbleweeds to get to it, but I'm sure it's worth it.

Where the early bird apparently hangs out later in the day.

And at the end of the adventure, Strix's Cruiser waits patiently for us, like a faithful steed prepared to carry us away.

Tomorrow: Rainbow Forest Museum and Rainbow Forest