Friday, November 15, 2013

The Continued Search for "The Skull"

Well, I had eliminated some areas of the park where "The Skull" could be, so I decided to spend the day on the East side getting a few things done. I started off in Many Pools area where I quickly jumped off the traditional route to go look for "The Skull". This was a really good area with lots of hoodoos. I found some bighorn sheep up there and a ton of hoodoos, but there was no "Skull".I was happy to see the area, though because it was one of the best collections of iron concretions in the park.

I could see down into petroglyph canyon below and see people hiking in there. I turned around and went back into Many Pools. This place was definitely impacted from the amount of people that had been hiking there recently. But there were no major problems, so I moved on to the next spot. On this day, that spot was Canyon Overlook. I knew there was graffiti down near the end of the trail.

So I brought out the hammer and the brush. I had to completely remove the top of the rock. This is common procedure. I educated the visitors out there and heard the usual from them that it is such a shame. Yet, people continue to do it. I made sure to get a before and after to give to our facebook team.
They ended up putting it on the website and it made it all the way to KSL Salt Lake evening news. The guy pushing over the rock in Goblin Valley was still so fresh that this was something that people were interested in for a short time. Yet we do this so frequently it is ridiculous. The finish of the day was a trip up Shelf Canyon. This produced some garbage to pick up, but mostly just an enjoyable hike. 

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