Pictographs @ MindSay 
Friday we took the entire core (70+ kids) down 6 1/2 miles of the Monument Canyon trail in Colorado National Monument. With bus schedules dictating our day ... and a return trip to the "bus barn" after leaving the school, to trade buses as something was broken and the first bus could not make the trip up into the Monument.... we had a mere 3 1/2 hours to make the entire trek . . . a process I lovingly call the "death march". It turned out to be a great day, though... the kids were all troopers and I think most if not all of them had some fun! Here are a few being eaten by FROG ROCK! LOL!
Yesterday I grabbed a friend who was with me when we missed a cache.... ended up on a trail way above the desired location... so, looking down on it some weeks ago, we pledged to return.... Turned out to be "Mike the Headless Chicken" Days in Fruita so the area was alive... and there was a "Hike for Mike" event going on in the very same area we were headed for. We discovered that the Mike this event was dedicated to was a fellow science teacher that died while on a field trip with students - hiking to Delicate Arch a couple of years ago. The proceeds will be used to help fund the extension of our riverfront trail - hopefully from one end of the valley to the other someday! After we went and retrieved the cache... I dug in my pocket and found enough to sponsor myself in the hike... seemed like a fitting memorial and a good cause! Today I called another friend (don't want to burn out hiking buddies!).. and off we went to walk down a streambed strewn with petroglyphs (technically pictographs, I believe)... headed to the Colorado River. A little over 2 miles each way.. and such a beautiful day! The cactus are just starting to bloom. So nice
She found the first stage of this multi-cache!
The Indian Paintbrush is in bloom- this is one of the largest clumps I have ever seen!
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Above.... look deep under the overhang to see the pictographs
and the claret cup cacti are just beginning to open up... my favorite!
Prickly pear cactus blossoms and yucca blooms in background
More pictographs...
No picture of the final adventure... there was another geocache just across the road when we got back to the parking area... so I headed over to grab it. Finding it under the juniper tree was no problem.. a large cookie tin covered with rocks. I moved the camo and reached for the can when the bright pattern of yellow and black caught my eye from under the can. Three coils of a snake, about and inch in diameter, were visible - it never moved, but I was frozen in my tracks... pretty sure I wasn't brave enough to continue retrieving ... and then replacing the can. But a bit hesitant to replace the camo, also. Finally I decided it was happy where it was and would allow me to push the rocks up around the can. I'll save signing THAT log for another day!
I left fairly early in the morning to drive down near Del Rio to go camping at Seminole Canyon. It is a secluded little spot on the Texas-Mexico border near the Amistad National Evaporation Pond. I arrived and checked into the camp grounds around noon and proceded to the area where I had decided to camp. It has an impersive view of the surrounding country-side and was well away from where anyone else would be staying. Of course when I arrived there was an elderly gentleman at my camping spot. He was just there to have a quick lunch and enjoy the view and was going to be leaving shortly, so it was no big deal. He offered to share his vienna sausages, fritos and cheese dip with me. I declined and proceded to break out my lunch of deer summer sausage, assorted cheeses, apples, grapes and home made bread. I offerd the guy some of my eats, whch seemed to me alot better than his convienence store fare. But he was happy with his junk food. He apparently had recently retired and was running away from his kids. We talked about his job and life in general over lunch and when he left he gave me some tangerines from an organic farmer near San Antonio that he had visited with a couple days earlier. After lunch I set up camp and relaxed for a bit.
One of the main attractions of the park I was staying at is the Indian Pictographs in the rock shelters along the canyon walls. They were painted by the Lower Pecos People who settled into the area about 10,000 to 12,000 years ago. The Lower Pecos people are belived to have began the rock art about 3,000 to 4,000 BP.
In Seminole Canyon is one of the largest of theLower Pecos People's rock shelters, know as the Fate Bell Shelter. It is covered with thousands of paintings, some of which are still buried under the 10 to 12 feet of ashes that covers the floor of the shelter.
Many of the rock shelters in the canyons were used only for ceremonial purposes and don't have the same arrangements as the Fate Bell Shelter. One of the interesting things in the shelter is the large stone that was used as a butcher block for over ten thousand years by the inhabitant of the shelter. It is a large block of limestone that has turned shiny and waxy from the fats of countless animals soaking into the stone.
There are also holes in other rocks that were used for grinding sotol roots and nuts.
Of the countless paintings a couple that I found really interesting are, one of a what is supposed to be a screaming panther or mountain lion. The lines coming out of the mouth are to represent the sound. To me it looks kinda like a barfing monkey.
Another painting that I liked was the of a bear headed winged shaman and his attendents.
All of the paintings are thought to have been done by the local shamans during ceremonies that involved eating of Datura, Mescal Bean and Peyote. This combination of alkaloides, allowed the shamans to enter the spirit world and allowed then to fly arround as well. Many of the paintings have symbolism of door ways to the spiritworld, shamans, monsters and represetations of the sotol plant, which was an important food source to the local people.
On the way out of the canyon stands a cool sculpture by Bill Worrell called "The Maker of Peace", it was inspired by the ock painting that are found throughout the canyons.
After my hike a treked back to my campsite and watched the sun set before cooking supper and heading to bed, so that I would be ready to get up early the following morning for a day of adventure.
Well, I made it back safely and had an extremely interesting trip, but I'm dirty and tired so I'm going to take a shower and go to bed. Here are a few pictures of my trip. There are many more to come, but just not right now.
