Sloan Canyon NCA - Petroglyph and Cowboy Trail Loop

Hiked March 23, 2026. Fourteenth hike of the year.

Apparently, I lied about blogging Hike 12, next. Had some issues getting the right photos uploaded.

This is a place I frequent, because of the combination that it's near Las Vegas, of moderate length (not too long, not too short), and very rewarding, on account of the petroglyphs.

It's in the Inspirada neighborhood of Paradise Township. "Paradise Township" is what the area of Clark County near "The Strip" is formally called. "Inspirada" is the particular new neighborhood, with pretty continuous construction over the past 12-14 years. As a result, the drive to get here changes all the time.

The first time I tried getting here, the BLM directions were out of date, and I tried to make it from the Las Vegas Blvd side. That was kind of crazy. Looks like my first successful trip was a bit later in March 2013.

Apparently, it's been a while since I've been back, since, upon researching a return to this site, I learned the "new" parking area and visitor contact station that was there the last few times I was here was being replaced by a larger parking lot and permanent visitor contact station, so access to that parking lot was/is closed, from November 2024 to November 2026.

Currently, parking is limited to a wide area of the road, on the south side of Democracy Drive, just east of Nawghaw Poa Road. If your GPS won't take you there, you can try Adventura Park, which is currently also the nearest public restroom to the parking area. Once at Adventura Park, keep heading south, then jig left, then right, again (getting back on to Via Firenza), continuing south, until you hit Democracy Drive. Make a right at Democracy drive, then look for the wide shoulder on the left (south) side of the road, and park, there.

For a small number of people coming from eastern Henderson, south of Anthem, or the western part of Inspirada, you may be directed straight to Democracy Drive, and you'll arrive south of Adventura Park.

On March 23, 2026 (the day of this hike), the creosote was blooming like wild. Desert mallow were also pretty common. Also, some desert chickory, yellow primrose, and a few Mojave aster.

Despite the modest distance for the loop, the way out is slightly uphill, and largely in a sandy or gravelly wash. It can also get hot, and there is very limited shade, so be sure you have enough to drink. The "official" recommendation on the sign is 1/2 gallon per person. Personally, I think that's high, unless it's well into the 100s, but it's better to have more liquids than you need than not enough.

The other slight barrier is that there area few dry waterfalls. While some of them are easy walk ups, a few will require a step or two of scrambling, meaning some size, balance, and strength. They are literally just a step or two, but you'll use your hands, and smaller people may need some help.

You can avoid having to descend those dry waterfalls by continuing past the petroglyph panels an additional 1/4 mile or so, until you see the "Cowboy Trail," to your right. That takes you up a fair incline, adjacent to a volcanic plug.

As you reach the pass at the side of that plug, you've got a nice view over the Las Vegas Valley.

The trail then zig-zags down the canyon, rejoining the Petroglyph trail about 1/2 mile south of the petroglyph area.

Because the trail now starts down on Democracy Drive (near where I used to park, before Democracy Drive got paved) the roundtrip distance is now a little over 6 miles, at least according to my Alltrails recording. Total altitude gain is given as 633 feet. So figure an extra 1/2 mile and 50 feet or so from if you started at the visitor contact station.

Plenty more pictures below, but nothing else to add.

In addition to hike 12 (Big Morongo Canyon Preserve), which I haven't blogged, yet, I redid the Mount Wilson Trail, to Firest Water. Not sure which of those two I'll blog next. Also, should get at least one decent hike in next weekend.

Petroglyphs and Pictoglyphs in Chaco Culture National Historical Park, New Mexico

Post two of three for Chaco Culture National Historical Park, which I visited on June 20-22, 2025. My first post is here.

Not surprisingly, in addition to the many Ancestral Puebloan structures, there are a large number of petroglyphs and pictoglyphs in the park. Also not surprisingly, because some of these would be about 1,000 years old, many of the petroglyphs (pecked) and pictoglyphs (painted) are hard to see.

The one at the top is the one I especially wanted to see. It is widely believed that the painting is of the precursor to the Crab Nebula, which is to say, a star that went supernova, back in 1054. So, yes, nearly 1,000 years old!

It's painted on the bottom of an overhang, and gets little or no direct sunlight, helping it survive all these years. You look straight up to see it.

I've been seeing pictures of it in astronomy books and magazines for as long as I can remember. Nice to finally see it in person.

People who study archeoastronomy (ancient astronomy) determined that the crescent moon and star-like figure are roughly of the proper orientation and separation to reflect what might have been seen by an ancient skywatcher, back on July 4, 1054, when that super-bright but temporary star would have appeared in the constellation Taurus, near a crescent moon, in the early AM hours of that date.

To get to the "Supernova pictoglyph," it's about a 7 1/2 mile roundtrip walk, along a mostly-level canyon bottom. However, erosion has cut down enough to require a couple of detours. Make sure you know where you're trying to get to, so you don't get off track after the detours.

The trail to the pictoglyph is the trail that heads to Penasco Blanco. It's about another 3/4 mile past the pictoglyphs. I did not continue to them, as I was a bit rushed. If I had more time, I would have. They sound interesting.

The trail starts from near Pueblo del Arroyo, and heads mostly west, along an old dirt road. After a half mile, you pass Kin Kletso. Three-quarters of a mile past that, is Casa Chiquita. About a half mile after that, is the signed "Petroglyph trail", which parallels the main trail, but runs along the cliff.

Interestingly, there were bike racks at Kin Kletso and Casa Chiquita. Apparently, the path here is still designated as Navajo Service Road 14, so Navajo can drive that segment, and bikes are permitted. Not sure how far you can ride your bike, but, if an 8 mile roundtrip hike to Penasco Blanco sounds too far, you might want to investigate with the NPS to see how far you can ride a bike, if you have a bike. At the very least, it's about half the distance.

Other petroglyph concentrations are above Una Vida (some pictured, above), between Pueblo Blanco and Hungo Pavi, and small panels near the campground and near the administrative buildings (all of which I also visited). There are several other areas with petroglyphs and ruins that I did not visit, which I would try to visit, were I to return. Even though Chaco Culture National Historical Park looks small on a map, it's still a lot to take in, even over two days. I could defintely use two more days, just to visit the other publicized trails and areas. Unfortunately, it's a long drive from the LA area, and most airport car rentals do not allow for off-pavement driving of their rental cars, so I'm not sure when that will be. I'd probably try for an equinox trip, for the sunrise and sunset alignments, as a counterpoint to the summer solstice trip we did, this time.

Chaco Culture National Historical Park, NM

Chaco Culture National Historical Park is located in New Mexico, some three hours from Albuquerque. The closest cities are Gallup, to the south, and Farmington, to the north. From either direction, it's nearly 1 1/2 to nearly 2 hours from those larger cities to Chaco, and involves 13 miles of driving on rough dirt roads from the north, or 20 miles of the same from the south. From either side, it's about an hour from the the closest gas stations. The NPS warns that either approach can become impassable when wet, so it's a good idea to bring extra supplies, in case you get stranded there for a few unexpected days, while the roads dry out.

Despite the significantly longer dirt segment, if you're coming from the south or west (Las Vegas area, Flagstaff area, or points further south and west) the overall longer drive to get to the north approach means the southern route is going to be a lot quicker. So that's what we did: I-40 east, Exit 53, for Thoreau, and NM-371. (That sign, btw, is what you see when you leave the park and head back towards I-40).

I have to say I expected the signage for Chaco off of I-40 to be more prominent (as in, a big, giant, NPS-brown sign, as opposed to a smallish green sign, nearly at the actual offramp). However, my Waze did direct correctly. Still, I did stop shortly after getting off the freeway, to confirm on a map that I was heading the right way.

The NPS site suggests not trusting gps directions, but I suspect that's from earlier iterations, and the big companies have since figured out based on user feedback how to actually get there without driving their customers into empty desert or roads too rough for passenger cars.

From NM-371, it's about 27.5 miles north, to NM-57/Navajo Service Route 9, then another 13 miles or so, to Navajo Service Route 14, which is also NM-57. That's where the pavement ends. About twenty miles later, somewhat after passing the stone NPS sign for Chaco Culture National Historical Park (which nicely frames Fajada Butte), you're back on pavement.

The drive on dirt was long, slow, but, overall, not as bad as feared. I still probably averaged less than 20mph, but the washboarding was only intermittent. I took particular care approaching cattle grates, as I had read that occasionally there are big dropoffs in the transitions. Also, there were a few hills with exposed rocks and limited visibility where I slowed and drove especially carefully, to avoid bottoming out or blowing out a tire. But, overall, no regrets about driving a Camry from the south.

Very little traffic either way on the dirt segment. I think I saw fewer than a half-dozen cars, each way. No real sandy areas on the drive, but there were a few areas of dried mud that would have been impassible when they were still mud. In my trunk, I had a few tire mats and a shovel, but they weren't needed.

I should note that my driving experience is specific to June 20, 2025, when we drove in, and June 22, 2025, when we drove out. Based on the dried, but not yet broken down mud ruts on the road, it seems likely that driving might have been problematic a few weeks earlier. Also, a few weeks after our trip, from July 3 through July 8, 2025, Chaco's NPS webpage noted that travel to Chaco via NM-57 (the south) "was not recommended at this time." So, obviously, in driving to Chaco, figuratively, at least, ymmv. It is sugggested that you call Chaco's visitor center prior to your visit, to confirm road conditions.

After stopping at the visitor center ($25/vehicle entrance fee, or a federal recreation pass, which I had), we headed first to see the "star" of Chaco Canyon, Pueblo Bonito. BTW, the names of the structures in Chaco are mostly either descriptive Spanish or corrupted Navajo. In this case, Pueblo Bonito means something like pretty town. It's the largest of the structures remaining. Once up to four stories high and with some 700 rooms, it provides a good idea of the sprawl of these "great houses." In this case, the city is laid out along the cardinal directions, so equinox sunrise and sunset is along the long, straight, southern wall of Pueblo Bonito.

A view of Pueblo Bonito from above (from the north mesa) is a few shots below, while the previous shots were of and within Pueblo Bonito. A number of folding chairs are in the courtyard, and may give you a sense of scale. I think the shot adjacent to this text was Chetro Ketl (slightly east of Pueblo Bonito), while the next two are from Pueblo del Arroyo. Those are just three of the six or so named houses and "great houses" (pueblos) near or adjacent to the paved road. Roughly five other named sites are accessible via "backcountry" trails from Chaco, with lengths of 3 to 8 miles roundtrip each. Several outlying sites are even further from the pavement than that.

Some of the excavated ruins have had more modern "stabilization" work done, including the roof drain and drop pipe here, and the support structure a few shots up. The NPS interpreters said that, under current-day policy, these structures would likely have been left buried or reburied for stabilization, but the add-ons were done quite some time ago, and you'll note them as you walk the ruins quite easily.

As previously noted, there are about a half-dozen major ruins adjacent to or within 1/2 mile of the pavement. Just seeing those would make a pretty full day, because walking to, through, and around each site means about 3/4 of a mile, each, so it would be 3-4 miles of walking, plus 18 miles or so of driving. Spend some time in the visitor center or just standing still for a while, and there's your day, even before adding even one of the "backcountry" trails. So, while we initially had booked one night of camping, we later added a second. I was very glad we did.

The next morning was the summer solstice, which coincided with our trip, so we figured we might as well do the solstice experience. That meant lining up a little after 5am for early entrance to Casa Rinconada (normally, the gates open at 7am, and close after dark, vatying some during the course of the year). Access to this event (summer solstice sunrise at Casa Rinconada) was limited to the first 100 people. I think, as it happened, there were fewer than that lined up, so everyone who wanted to got to experience the solstice sunrise there.

Casa Rinconada is smaller than a "great" house, but has a very large excavated kiva. Originally, the kiva would have been covered, but windows and doors were present. It's possible (though not certain) that, shortly after sunrise on the summer solstice, sunlight would have shone through a window and entered a door on the opposite side. Not quite Indiana Jones, but a possible non-chance alignment.

At any rate, we made the line, convoyed in, then parked, where instructed. We were in time for the sunrise, then, later, got to watch a ray of sun shine through a window, on to the opposite wall, then eventually make its way down to another door. Again, it's possible this was by design, and something the ancient inhabitants of Chaco would have experienced, over a thousand years ago.

It's also possible that, when the kiva was reconstructed by early antropologists, they placed the windows differently, and the alignment is just a crazy accident.

Regardless of this particular alignment, there seems little doubt that many of the Chaco structures (and, indeed, the interaction of many different Chaco structures) were built with attention to the heavens. Alignments for equinox and solstice, and, more obscurely, for major and minor lunar standstills, are found all around Chaco, especially in the layout of the pueblos and casas.

Beyond the big structures, one of the more interesting previous structures involved a "sun dagger," an alignment or rocks and a spiral petroglyph atop Fajada Butte. But visitation caused those rocks to shift, and access to the top of Fajada Butte is no longer allowed, and the sun dagger no longer hits its marks for solstices and equinoxes.

I'll probably have a follow up post or two. But I'll wrap this post up with this: Chaco Culture National Historical Park is way out there. There is no food or drink available for sale, no cabins or motel rooms for rent, and no showers. The camp sites are "primitive," meaning no electrical or sewer hookups. You'll only have what you bring (except for there is running water and flush toilets), and you'll either stay in a tent or an RV you brought yourself. On the other hand, there's a small ruin, right behind campsite #26.

If you plan to stay, make reservations ahead of time via recreation.gov. Campsite availability opens three months out. It's $20/night. Other than peak weekends (solstice or equinox, I expect) it seems like you can often catch even weekend availability within a week or two of the actual date. Still, if your plans are solid, good idea to reserve early, and eat the $20 camping fee if your plans change, rather than risk not being able to go, at all. That said, if you know you're not going to make it, go back on recreation.gov and cancel, so someone else can take the spot.

Crane Petroglyphs, Montezuma Castle and the Mohave Twins

Hiked March 15 and 16, 2025. Photos are generally in reverse order of the post.

Headed out of the Las Vegas area on the afternoon of March 15. First stop was the Mohave Twins, a geoglyph in the town of Fort Mohave, AZ. Nearly zero hiking involved. From Laughlin, NV, it's approximately 30 minutes / 15 miles south on AZ-95. The linked story above provides another link for driving directions. It'll also show up on google maps.

The Twins are represented as related to the local indigenous peoples, the Fort Mojave Indian Tribe, and may be close to 3000 years old. Because of the lack of an organic construction material, I expect accurately dating something like this would be difficult, to say the least. They're simiar to (but smaller than) the Blythe Intaglios, further to the south.

The Twins were just a little bonus, not too long of a detour off of I-40, but a chance to see something kind of different, and to let us "bag" something on that first, short driving segment. It's not a big enough deal to be a destination on its own, but it's definitely worth a short detour from other things. They're the last few pictures in this post.

BTW, the town and fort in Arizona are spelled with an "h," while the Indian Tribe now spells their name with a "j." I have seen the geoglyph referred to by both spellings. I went with the "h" spelling, here.

After the visit, we headed back up toward I-40 and stayed overnight in Kingman, AZ. Rather scenic drive to get to I-40, btw. Much more colorful than actually along I-40.

The next day, we headed east, through Williams, to Flagstaff, and I-17. From there, we then took I-17 south, to AZ-179, Exit 298.

That's the same exit you'd take for Sedona, but to get to the Crane Petroglyphs, you turn left (east) at the bottom of the ramp, and head into the Coconino National Forest. Incidentally, while the offramps from I-17 have a stop sign, traffic on AZ-179 does not have a stop sign. People who don't pay attention to signage may try to hit you as you cross under I-17.

We headed east from I-17 for a few miles, following the signs to the Crane Petroglyphs. Because they close at 3pm, we wanted to make sure to hit this, first.

Parking at the trailhead requires the AZ Desert equivalent of an Adventure Pass, which they call a Red Rock Pass, which you can buy at a vending machine in the lot. Five dollars a day, I think. Or, if you already have a federal public lands pass ("America the Beautiful," or similar), you can park there for free, if you hang your pass on your rearview mirror. Because I had the America the Beautiful pass, I didn't need to buy the day pass, so I didn't pay attention to what the price was.

From the parking area, it's about 1/4 of a mile down to your right to the visitor center, where you sign in. Flush toilet there, if you need it. Vault toilet, closer to the petroglyphs, as well.

There are some remains of the V-V (V Bar V) ranch that used to be here. Tall chimney, several fences and gates, and evidences of water diversions to capture runoff. I assume the diversions were from the ranch era, and not older.

In 1994, the Coconino National Forest acquired the land. The area was then rechristened as the Crane Petroglyphs Heritage Site. The namesake cranes are visible in the photo above this text, and a closer photo two shots, previous.

The name was adopted as an alternative to the "V-V Ranch Petroglyphs," because the Sinagua didn't want their written heritage to be referred to by the name of the ranchers that came long after they were created. Nonetheless, the V-V ranch did mostly prevent the petroglyphs from being defaced. There was only one relatively modern, Latin-lettered carving into those rocks.

It's an impressive collection of petroglyphs, about a 1/2 mile from the visitor center.

I have to admit I haven't studied the many petroglyphs I have seen in recent years to be able to figure out the connections and differences spread out across so much of the western United States, but I really should learn more. Of course, a lot of what is "known" is speculation. Even the oral histories from contemporary indiginous peoples may not always be the same as what the original artist may have intended, but it is often all we have to go on.

Volunteer interpreters were in the visitor center, and at the petroglyph panels.

These petroglyphs are attributed to the Sinagua (without water) group of indigenous people, who still live in the area, and claim a direct attachment to the petroglyphs.

The trail is flat, so relatively accessible. I saw several strollers being pushed along the trail. I did not see any dogs, and I'm not sure if dogs are allowed on this trail or not. A yellowish fruit was really common along the walk.

We walked back to the car, then drove back to I-17, and headed south about nine miles, to Exit 289, then followed the signs to Montezuma Castle National Monument. Fair-sized parking area, outside the visitor center. Pay or show your pass in the visitor center/bookstore. Then, there's a short, 1/2 mile or so loop, to view the "castle," with a scenic view of the adjacent Beaver River. This walk is entirely paved. You can not approach the ruins, but must view them from below. Impressive sight, and apparently mostly original masonry. The time period would have been roughly contemporaneous with Mesa Verde or Canyon de Chelley's cliff dwellings.

We returned to the car, then drove up to Sedona.