Two snakes

As I was riffling through a few of the LH's photographs to illustrate an article I'm working on, this image of a basaltic cliff jumped out at me. The concentric circles on the upper rock suggest the locale was Barrata Tank, a permanent water hole in Hell Canyon upstream from the SR 89 crossing. The thematic glyphs at Barrata are representations of the sun and other circles.

However, it was the snake that actually caught my eye. The shape of the head is that of a rattler. Furthermore, the zigzag is quite like the design of one of my favorite sweatshirts! In keeping with this theme, I also turned up the photo below; it's difficult to make out this fellow's head tho it's there in the center of his coil. On the other hand, his telltale rattle is very evident. But there's absolutely nothing zigzag about him.

I don't know if there are other pictures of any snakes, much less rattlers, in the LH's archives. Possibly not, because we saw few on our outings. Very strange -- there was a restaurant operator down in Peeple's Valley who was afraid of rattlers; he found them every time he ventured into the bush. We wanted to see snakes and so they made themselves scarce. The four rattlers we met in nearly 20 years of boondocking were 1) hiding in the rocks on the west side of Sycamore Canyon; 2) among the rocks on the way to the dam at Watson Lake; 3) among some boulders out Downers' Trail (pre-development), plus one timber rattler in the middle of the Copper Basin Road up near Spruce Mountain. Go figure.

Links to the Works of Nature: Finally an I-was-there description of the Great Snow of 19-aught-67; this by LindaG at her new Prescott Past blog. She was snowed in at Groom Creek. Maria Langer posts re: the dangers of quick sand in desert rivers, the Hassayampa in this case. Steve Ayres has written a report on getting to the bottom of Montezuma's Well. And for a really big picture of the natural earth, there's no better place than the daily photo from space at NASA's Earth Observatory. OK, OK, this just in -- and off-topic, but plenty worth the visit -- ROL Cats, translated from the Russian.

Seasonal Greetings...

...and please buy our beer. (Wasn't that from a Pogo-style Christmas carol? I'm not sure.) However, I apologize for not getting the Super Bowl promos. The sign above caught my attention instead ... somehow I couldn't help thinking "the narcs are coming...the narcs are coming."

The occasion was my first visit to a supermarket since just before Christmas. A pretty good record, if I do say so. But though I wasn't there, the marketing people were out in force. They made it very hard to forget one's Valentine upon entering Fry's. In fact, between the thoroughly heart-ed entrance and the chocolate/goodie niche (below), the beer folks' Super Bowl display didn't stand a chance.

Then at the back of the store, I spotted this display of the latest appliance toys. Look at the top row. Is nothing sacred? The commodified chocolate fountain, yet. Just in time for Valentine's Day, of course; for sure, it's the next major $10-15 item in the Salvation Army's small appliance department.

Footnote to the Partridge Creek petroglyph post (1/20/07): The Google has started sending inquisitive people to my piece about the three weird critters pecked into the rocks at that site. Being inquisitive myself, I checked out Google. Turns out that Elderhostel has scheduled a rock art recording session starting at Partridge Creek and working westward, primarily on private lands. Time: April -- a good month; not too cold, not too hot. I'm tempted. One other reference Google turned up was somewhat amusing -- my favorite upside-down creature was shown twice -- carefully turned right-side up. Wrong, guys!

Three Weird Critters

Partridge Creek is a major water course west of Ash Fork running south into the Big Chino. It was one of my late husband's favorite haunts for petroglyph photography. The creek cuts a winding course through sandstone and basalt, both favored materials for ancient rock art. I've got too many slides to count from our days of exploring the Yavapai outback-- most still unscanned. However, at one of the sites along this creek are three critters that fascinate me -- and I discovered that slides of them had been scanned.

This particular location is a small basalt cliff at a bend in the water course where temporary pools collect in wetter years. It appears to have been a favorite site for pecking rock art for centuries to judge from the varied styles that we found, some of them old enough to have been totally covered by desert varnish.

These Partridge Creek petroglyphs are typical of what we found at many sites in the greater Prescott area.

However, this guy really caught our attention. He's definitely larger than the usual critters one finds. And look at the eyes! I do suspect that someone other than the original artist carefully gouged the eyes deeper to make them pop. No idea of what sort of beast this might represent, if indeed it is representational.

Those eyes again! Yes, he is hanging upside down. And he's big -- about 3 feet from eyeball to tip of tail. Note the long fingers and impressively long tail.

This smaller creature is pecked into the wall a foot or so down from the upside-down fellow above. I'd consider him a possible frog image if there were no tail; the tail is also a tad too long for a horned lizard.

There you have it -- three of my favorite petroglyphs. Ever since I first saw them, I've had this urge to install bright red LEDs in those empty eye sockets. Maybe one of these days when I master PhotoShop....

Local Link of the Day

One of my favorite overlooked Prescott area places is the Agua Fria canyon. Starting more or less at the Bloody Basin Road where the road crosses a Real River With Water, the canyon heads on down to Black Canyon City. It's deep, rugged and seldom more than a mile or two from I-17. Today, most of the canyon is within the new Agua Fria National Monument; features (aside from free-running water) include major Indian ruins and petroglyphs. I bring up all this background because a photo essay on the canyon by Bruce Colbert has been posted at the Coyote Radio website; Bruce works for the Big Bug News, which serves the area from Black Canyon City up to Mayer and Humbolt.

Note: Krazy Kelvin from way Down Under in New Zealand has listed Walking Prescott at his 21 21 21 Great Blogs to Read. Give it a look-see; he reviews some interesting stuff there!

Link of the Day

Over ten years ago, my husband and I frequently explored a small piece of the Verde River canyon about a mile below the Sullivan Lake dam. An interesting spot: two long pools in the river, rugged canyon walls, a nearly impassable trek up river toward the dam, and splendid petroglyphs (including a repeated theme I called the pregnant elk.) We never got as far east as the confluence of Granite Creek with the river. Too bad; had we realized it, that lush spot is a state game and fish wildlife area open to the public. To find out more about the location, click here. I still have a bid in with friends to take me there one of these days!