Arches National Park
Personal Notes:
Courthouse Wash Rock Art
This page contains our personal notes on our visits to the Courthouse Wash rock art panel within Arches National Park.
Friday, April 13, 2007
3:04 p.m.
We’re at the Courthouse Wash Trailhead (Map Coordinates (NAD83): 38 36.420N; 109 35.163W; at an elevation of 4,001 feet). This is just off of Highway 191, just north of the bridge that crosses Courthouse Wash. It’s a paved lot with quite a bit of parking. The bike trail to Arches National Park begins here as well.
We put on our hiking boots and headed off toward the wash. It was our belief that the rock art panel was along one of the cliff faces within the wash itself. So we followed the obvious trail into the Park. Arches National Park has its border right along the road in this area.
We headed up the wash to a point where we couldn’t bet beyond and steep sandstone ledge. About that time we saw two people and their dog coming back out. So we followed their path across the stream and up a steep sandy bank. From there we could easily see the trail through the weedy brush and tall trees. All along the way we studied the cliffs for signs of the expected rock art, but nothing. We believe we walked about 1.5 miles up the wash, to a point across from a medium sized alcove and above an old water gauging station. Nothing. So we decided to give up for this trip and see if we couldn’t get more information as to the location of the ancient art.
On the way back to the trailhead we explored along the cliff faces on the west bank of the stream, near the road, where we had seen other hikers on previous trips. We could only go a short distance before we ran out of trail and ended in a weedy cluster of spindly trees.
Saturday, April 14, 2007
2:50 p.m.
We’re at the Courthouse Wash Trailhead again, hoping that we’ll finally locate the rock art panel.
3:30 p.m.
Success. We found the rock art at GPS Coordinates (NAD83): 38 36.339N; 109 34.820W; at an elevation of 4,163 feet. What we discovered is that after you cross the highway bridge over Courthouse Wash, look for the Arches National Park boundary marker on the left. Behind it there is a line of large rocks marking the border and preventing vehicles from entering. Follow those rocks to a trail that heads up the red slope toward the cliffs above the highway. If you stand at the beginning of the trail and look you’ll see a very large slab of sandstone that has fallen from the cliff face in the distance. Right above that large rock you will see a lightly desert varnished vertical surface of smooth sandstone. That is where the rock art is located. If you look closely you can make out some of the larger figures.
Follow the narrow trail up the slope until you come to an information sign. Above the sign there are cairns that mark the climb up to the base of the rock art panel. The panel is several feet wide and is mostly pictographs of the Barrier Canyon style. However, there are several petroglyphs worked into the rock on top of some of them, as well as a good number of Fremont or Anasazi petroglyphs worked into the dark desert varnish of a large slab of sandstone that is angled at the base of the main panel. There are some interesting figures here, with some vivid colors, where they have not been destroyed by graffiti and intentional destruction.
