Day-2

This day starts out on a long ride in seach of history....and we found it.

Look closely through the trees. Too bad I can't tell you where it is.

Hidden from view and secluded. Just the way it should be.

A view from within.............

This fast is becoming a favorite. Wow. Pristine and Beautiful.

Heading out to do a little more scouting. We think there is more to see today.

Spent the remainder of the day hiking in to another site. This turned out to be spectacular.

Check out the landbridge we have to cross.

I think Josh said this was something like being in Mario Brothers Mushroom world.

Sure felt like it.

Pretty crafter Designers

A View from the Top




My palms get sweaty just looking a this photo. This shows a very small portion of the overall perspective of this site. Everything about this place says 'fortress-keep out.'

Pictures just don't do this justice.....it's a very long ways down.

Look closely to see the remains of the fortress wall that guarded the landbridge.

Time to call it day and hike out of here.

Day-1

Morning Sunrise. Time to Ride.

It was very cold (low 30's) last night. I felt bad for Josh since I brought a cot to sleep on, but honestly I think I was colder with the airflow under me. Wasn't expecting those temperatures.

Fuel Problems

So while I am lying on my back against a rock to rest I notice the moon rising through the 'fins.'

Thought this was a nice view while Josh was busy transferring fuel from one tank to another due to an unexpected hole.

A fun stop on the way out to the Maze. Yeah, this is pretty remote alright.

Maze overlook. Nevermind the biker shorts I had to borrow from Josh since I forgot my hiking ones back at camp. Good thing he had them along for the ride or I was in for a long hot day of hiking naked. I wasn't about to quit here. The fun was just starting.

Josh at the Harvest Scene. Note the size of this panel.

One very cool Picto of a very mean warrior.

Time to hike out this place and get to the mountains to setup camp.

Trip Summary

Day 1 Josh forgets Cody Maverick. Big Bummer.

Camped on the cot and Josh the rocks.

Day 2-4 camped in tent on ground. Felt bad for Josh not having a cot. Cot = too cold anyways.

Took a ride out to the Maze Overlook

On the way spotted a lone flower in the road. Very pretty.

Climbed down into the Maze. Found some Moki steps. Maybe modern.

Saw an Anasazi snake etched on the wall down in the bottom of the wash.

Hiked into the Harvest Scene. Pretty neat to see. Worth the hike.

Josh rubbed a hole in his rear fuel tank
Drained remaining into a bottle and filled the front tank

I took a rest on my back an noticed the moon in the daylight sky.

Back to camp for some good grub
Josh saves the day and cooks up the cheesy potatos.

Stopped by the Colorado on the way to No-Where.

Found a great camp site at No-Where overlooking the No-Where Mesa.

Slept in the Tootsie Roll for the next few days

Saw a lot of Elk tracks on our way back in.

Found a ruin in it's pristine state. WOW.

Made the hike out to very cool lookout ruin. Pointed out some kivas below and

decided not to hike it. What a hike and what a view.

Noticed the fortress wall on the way out that would have guarded access via a land bridge.

Stopped by roadside ruins the next day.

Very cool arch located here.

Took
a drive out to a cave.

Spotted some smaller ruins on the way in and an obvious cleared area where a wall could have surrounded.

Found another set on the way up. Pretty destroyed but great to see. Had a couple of bread oven looking structures. Lot's of pottery shards.

Fingerprints in the mortar was pretty cool to see.

Notice their knife sharpening cuts in the rock on the way out.

Located another small set again.

Beautiful negative handprint here.

This cave is huge. Hike up was fun. Complete set of negative handprints. Positive prints as well. Side by side.

Lot's of graffiti here over some really neat things. Not a good thing.

Gigantic grinding stones found here. Giant slabs actually.

Found evidence of the Hyde Exploring Expedition from late 1800's.

Next stop was another cave.

Lot's of Moki steps and prints here. Kids were obviously all over the place and mothers didn't want them to fall...hence, the Moki's.

Kid prints, baby prints, color prints-red, yellow, green, etc.

Wonderful picto's here also.

Steep drops = death

Prints very high on ceiling = high risk of death

Sillohouets on wall left from pigment stains = cool lifesize ghosts

Huge yellow drawings on ceiling - 15 or 20 feet

Headed out another wash to find a secluded ruin. Found another smaller wall in a corner up a wash. Probably had not been visited for many many years. Left no footprints on this one.

Very cool washes here where the run-off converges. Cool sinks and rock formations. Unique for sure.

Hiked all over the place searching this one.

Found it. Came out on top. Specatacular. Resides adjacent to a 100ft' waterfall (if flowing). Just awesome.

No way to enter. Entry is high risk = death = not this time.

Handprint found here below and a grinding stone down a 100 yards.

Another set opposite canyon wall. Not as cool. Easy access. Small cistern here for food something. Definitely felt like a mass grave site for some reason.

Another small alcove with ruin on opposite wall. Triangle entry, triangle floor shape. Pretty cool actually.

Hike out of wash is wet, green, cool, and lush. Defintely a place to grow food.

Eagle eye spots another driving home. Have to drop in and see.

Bigger than it looks. Very cool.

Whoa. Nice panel found just around the corner. Completely untouched and probably not visited for a very long time. Really cool stuff on this panel.

Trip over. Loaded up. 4 nights camping. Too fun. Great food. Cold first two nights. Don't want to leave.

One more stop. Another set of ruins. Far wall - very high up and down...no way to even get close. Have to think like Pooh on this one.

Found old airstrip - raced the truck an moto's down the strip leaving a dust cloud behind.

Now we can call it a day. Hiked 25 or 30 miles and Rode a couple hundred. Nice relaxing trip with good food and friend.

Long depressing ride home. Trying to figure out how to make another trip in the fall.

Last Stop

One last stop. Yes, there are ruins there on the other side of that 400 ft deep canyon wall....guess I will have to come back.

Gear Down

Loaded up and heading home.

Comb Wash

Had to snap a photo of Comb Wash.

Accident

Stumbled into this by accident. A whole panel 20 feet wide. I thought this was a great shot of a small section.

Corn

What a place to grow corn.

Way Up There

There was no way to get into this one after much consideration.

Indian Paintbrush

Lots of reds, yellows, and greens. Desert plant life is awesome.

Wowza

Speaks for itself

From Inside

This really illustrates how big and to think that only 10 steps in front of Josh the floor falls out into a 60-80 foot sheer drop. There are also handprints on the ceiling directly above the wall. My knees were shaking just thinking about it....and I have been known to do some crazy things.

Heads and Bodies

Ghosts. Clearly heads and bodies. Some legs are visible. These are lifesize and exposed. I reckoned that the pigment wore off leaving stained silhouettes. Only a few a few are shown. The wall was covered.

Big Ruin

View From the Side

Hyde Exploring Expedition

Here lies the Hyde team initials from some late 19th and early 20th century explorers.

A Great Picto

Giant Grinder

Huge grinding stone.

Mouth of the Whale

A view from the mouth. This place was huge. Note the obvious ruins on the far wall cliff.

More Graffiti

This is just terrible. Note the white image. There were twenty more just like this.

Vandals

Are Vandels a true representation of American Heritage or what? The clan sign here has been shot at least 8 times from the bullet holes I counted. As always the vandels always destroy something else probably never seen. Note the Anasazi Man (light gray) to the right of the second 8.

Beatiful Print

A wonderful example of a negative print. Very common.

Fingerprints

I bet they were muddy.

Slim and Josh

I thought  they looked cute together. Josh left Cody Maverick stranded at home this year so Slim had to fill in.

Bread Ovens

I call these the bread ovens. I am sure they were not.

Thrill of the Hunt

There just isn't quite anything like this. Theses canyons are big and vast. Wondering around them is a wonderful thing. Algea growth on a rock starts to look like a pictograph, a leaning boulder starts looking like a hideout of somekind. In any event, you just never know what you might find as you wonder, sometimes aimlessly and sometimes with a purpose. I had no sooner picked up a pottery shard on the trail to look at and Josh says, "hey, look at this" from about 100 yards up the trail. Sure enough we had stumbled into another ruin. All in all I believe we visited 11 or 12 ruin sites and quite a few panels. Some sites named after fish parts, butterflies, canyons, and little girl playhouses. To walk over a canyon rim and find a site is as exhilariting as it comes. Some are reachable, others are not. The distinctive patterns of the sites as far as building structure, artwork, location, etc. become more and more recognizeable now that I have viewed such a variety. Some just have a feeling of fortress, others burial, and others a place of dwelling or storage.

Food on the Trail

So Josh buys these stinky onion bagels that a Bear wouldn't even eat. Yeah they were good. Since we hauled the bikes down with the truck we had a cooler and this really opens up the food options. Yogurts, Ham, Eggs, Cheeses, Choc. Milk, O.J., you name it. What a treat to not be eating and MRE from a bag. So Josh brings his favorite Apple Sausage....oh it was good....so I whipped up the pancakes with PB and Syrup. Doesn't get much better. I love breakfast, especially when I've been whipped from a day of riding and hiking at a real man's pace. I forgot to bring a few things, but then again it always works out. A little Ham on a slice of Bread, no mayo and a little salt on the eggs, no pepper. Food is always fun to have around the campsite. Cheetos and Chip's aHoy. This area has bears so we thought we might as well bait em' with some beef jerky tied to a couple of cans to give us some warning if one walked in on us. We decided against it and put things away nicely and slept with one eye open smelling like Jerky and Apple Sausage ourselves.

Evening Notes

3 nights in and the moon continues to grow larger each night. The first night we camped just outiside of Hite Marina. The temperatures dropped into the 30's with cold air spilling over on my head into my bag. It was bitter cold and was bummed....as I was leaving the house I set my beanie hat aside thinking it wouldn't be needed. That a mistake. The night was we pulled into the Natural Bridges area and headed up the Bears Ears to camp at higher elevation after finding a wonderful spot overlooking the Cedar Mesa. What a view of an incredible area. Again the evening was cold and we were spent from the days activities of motoring up to the Maze and hiking 6-7 miles down in. Too tired to put up a fire, so we crawled in and hit the sack. Another very cold night in the Tootsie Roll, but the breeze was less and I was able to clog up the sack openning with some clothes. Slept ok. Night three, too tired again for a fire. Slept like a log with my sweatshirt hoodie and socks on. Should have thought of that sooner. Night four. Big fire and stayed up telling stories about each others' mother-in-laws. Ha. Lights out and gone for the night. This time with the socks off, but hoodie on. Warmer night. Almost a full moon. It's good to have a friend you can kick back with and eat fried potatos and cheese with. Spilled the salt on my cheesy potatos, but they tasted even better after that. Ran out of pepper.

Flower in the Desert

The ground is so hard here my kickstand won't even punch a hole in the ground, but this little flower finds a way to grow smack in the middle of the road. I was shocked when I came flying around the corner. I had to stop. It was the only thing not brown or red for miles.

Overlook

One of many overlooks. Better have good brakes.

Gear Up

The morning ritual.

Tootsie Roll

Geez it's been really cold at night.

Monster Beast

Big Hoof

Oh My

Incredible. No other way to state it. Pristine.

A Very Rare Find

This is it. Don't even ask where.

Visitors

I hate the fact that so many ruins are being visited more and more, but I have to say this little mascot has seen more than his fair share.

The Expanse

If there was any question about the possibility of becoming dinner.....for a buzzard.

Perspective

A little perspective on life. This was a tough picture to get. It is difficult to capture the expanse below and this illustrates a small portion...one small man on a very big edge of uncertainty...