Utah Unfiltered

Meet the authors: we have a band! We recently played at a music festival in the Manti-La Sal mountains. The stage was at 9000 feet above sea level. Absolutely the highest elevation gig we’ve ever played. We took the stage at 11 PM. The high temperature that day was 98 degrees F. By the time we played, the temp had dropped to 45 degrees and we were frozen. Art demands sacrifice, I guess.

A petroglyph panel near Crescent Junction, May 2025. This site features hundreds of glyphs scattered across a boulder field.

We accidentally found these petroglyphs while hiking in Emery County. There were lots of panels in the general area. It’s a well known site that we “discovered” by accident. Neat!

We got completely lost hiking one day and found this - some critter’s fossilized skull embedded in a cliff face. Emery County, Utah. Sometime in the summer of 2024.

Eastern Collared lizard being extremely tolerant of my invasion of its personal space. Somewhere near Crescent Junction, May 9, 2025.

Two bighorn sheep. We found these in a narrow crack in a free standing boulder. The crack is about 1.5 feet (.5 meters) wide. There were dozens of petroglyphs carved into the two surfaces of the crack. March 30, 2025.

A six toed foot… this petroglyphs is massive, probably around 3 feet (1 meter) long! It also has faint traces of red pigment on it. Part of a much bigger panel. We’ll be posting more in the coming days.

The Aurora Borealis, Carbon County, Utah.

The Ute tribe have an oral tradition that a woman of the Ancient Ones (ancestral Puebloans) gave birth at a site near Emery, Utah. To commemorate this birth, they carved this glyph of the woman in labor. The story goes on to say that if, at midday on the fall equinox, you stand with your back to this petroglyph, the woman’s shadow will be visible on the opposing cliff face. Well, yesterday (9/22/24) was the fall equinox. Story confirmed! What an amazing experience.

A petroglyph of a woman giving birth. Somewhere in the San Rafael Swell.

A petroglyph in the San Rafael Swell.

A petroglyph panel in Southeastern Utah. March 30, 2024.

Pictographs in Sego Canyon, Utah. March 19th, 2024.

Sunrise in the San Rafael Swell, March 2, 2024.

Sunrise and sunset near Goblin Valley.