Death Valley 2022/23

[Beardilocks]

After that I went on a short petroglyph hunt.  This "set" is within a few miles of a well know site near a spring, but I have never seen it mentioned anywhere before.  I found it when I was scouring some old maps actually looking for forgotten tourist destinations in the park.  I chalked it up to the map being off by a bit (as is common in old maps) since it wasn't much more than a mile from the other site.  Cartographer's error.  But I decided to investigate.

There was a plethora of good petroglyph canvases in the area, which often means that you will find absolutely nothing.  Lol.  The perfect area to drive yourself completely nuts checking every rock to find zip.  But I found one, and only one, large boulder adorned with petroglyphs.

These glyphs appeared quite old.  They at least look older than the other nearby glyphs.  They are more faded & patinated and the boulder they are on has since fractured (after the glyphs were carved) and I'm sure several glyphs are lost on large chunks of the rock that now face down in the desert. 

This one was the first I found and very intriguing.  It is faded almost past recognition and seems to be 4 glyphs grouped together.  Possibly snake, sun, maybe a bird, and... the other one is very hard to make out.


Hit it with DStretch to try to drag out some detail.


This nearly invisible one was just above it.


It appears to be a figure or sigil inside a circle.  Which is a bit more rare of a design style.


Classic bird footprint style that you see in UT and the four-corners area more than in DV.  Or maybe just an abstract scribble.  Who knows.


Almost looks like a dragonfly.


There were several spirals around existing orifices in the rock.  Feel free to make your own interpretations.








Cool map design or... 




Also in the area I found several dead-fall traps.  At least I'm guessing this one could be.  Unconventional materials.  Pet's grave?




Likely campsite at one time or another. 


Interesting site.  Always cool to find a new set of glyphs.