A night in the lower 20's frosted the truck and froze the water jugs almost solid. After I found a nice level spot for the truck last night I noticed tracks of a large animal in that area. A kiosk nearby had sample tracks. Mine looked suspiciously like mountain lion. Gulp! I feel a little better because I just picked up some pepper spray that I now keep handy at night.
Sipapu Natural Bridge is 220 feet high, has a span (side to side) of 268 feet, is 31 feet wide (front to back) and 53 feet thick. The bridge is situated in a deep canyon with 500 feet walls of sandstone. A .5+ mile trail (one way) leads down to the canyon floor. Metal stairs, railings and wooden ladders are used where required. At the bottom, the trail crosses a small stream with plenty of rocks to keep the feet dry. Wet weather may create some serious mud problems though. You're too close to the bridge at the bottom for a good picture.
A short distance from Sipapu is the Horsecollar Ruin. A .3 mile trail takes you to an overlook with an Anasazi round and a square kiva (ceremonial chamber) tucked under one overhang on the far side and living quarters under another. This area was inhabited from 1 AD to about 1300.
Kachina Natural Bridge is 210 feet high, has a span (side to side) of 204 feet, is 44 feet wide (front to back) and 93 feet thick. The hike down to the floor is .75 miles one way with a drop of 400 feet. Shadows kept me from getting a really good picture. Lots of steps have been cut into the sandstone. It looks like they use a saw to make many parallel and diagonal cuts and then chisel the rest away.
Owachomo Natural Bridge is 106 feet high, has a span (side to side) of 180 feet, is 27 feet wide (front to back) and 9 feet thick. While the most easy to get to it's also the most spectacular, probably because it's so thin and you have views with nothing in front or behind it but sky. The hike down to the floor is only .2 miles one way with a drop of 180 feet.
04/10/01 Hiking Owachomo Loop Trail:
While climbing up and down to the natural bridges yesterday I was impressed with all the canyon walls. Today I decided to do the 8.6 mile Owachomo Loop Trail. Parking the truck at the Owachomo parking lot I took the 2.7 mile trail across the loop road to the Sipapu parking lot and went down the 500 foot drop to the canyon floor. From here it was 2.3 miles to the Kachina Natural Bridge.
Last night had been just about freezing and the temperature didn't rise very much all day. Wind and clouds kept it in the lower 30's and I even had a few snow flakes. All three bridges are in Armstrong Canyon. This canyon has deep canyon walls in excess of 500 feet with little soil or scree on them. A stream flows along the canyon floor but is never more than 5-10 feet wide even though the old creek bed is 100-200 feet wide between canyon walls.
I came across an overhang just above the creek bed with approximately 50 hands painted on the smooth wall surface. They had the right color so I don't think they were the work of kids even though there was only one other pictograph in the area.
After a while I came to some ruins 100 feet up the canyon wall. As it turns out these were Horsecollar Ruins described above. I climbed up and wandered around for a few minutes before continuing on.
It's 3.2 miles from Kachina Bridge to Owachomo parking lot. 20 minutes from Owachomo I took a picture of an interesting rock formation. When I looked closer I saw lots of petroglyphs 75 feet above me. Climbing up I saw a few ruins and a sign warning a fall from the ledge along the petroglyphs would probably be fatal. Walking out on the ledge I saw three spirals down at the end. Inching my way down towards them I was all but hanging over the edge of the ledge. As it was I couldn't get a picture head on but took one from the side. I found out later this site is called Shoe Panel. A huge rock sits on top of this formation and from one angle it looks like a wooden shoe.
The sun played peekaboo through the clouds all day and the wind hit 20+ mph at times. I even saw a snowflake or two. Along about 5pm I saw a lot more of them. It came down good and heavy and I thought it prudent to move out of my back country camping spot and spring for $10 at the National Monument Campgrounds. It's a good thing I moved when I did because they almost had a full house when I got there.