Alkali Ridge National Historical Landmark

Here it is, the write up about the actual landmark site; took three attempts to find it, but exploring is half the fun of being an adventurer.  Roy couldn't be on this part of the adventure with me, so my dog Jenna volunteered to keep an eye on me.

I need to give a bit of background history on the site; it will tie in with the chocolate exhibit at the Natural History Museum in Salt Lake City.  The pottery that cacao was found in came from this landmark site; it proves these ancestral people used it before the Aztec in Mexico.  So, in the summer of 1908, Byron L. Cummings (University of Utah) continued his archaeological work in the Southeastern Utah region by focusing on upper Montezuma Canyon, including a small excavation at Alkali Ridge.  Along on this expedition was Alfred V. Kidder who became a leader in the field of archeology.  However, it wasn't until John Otis Brew of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology; a museum affiliated with Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that Alkali Ridge was fully explored.  Three separate expeditions (1931, 32, 33) exposed the massive settlements that existed in this area covering Basketmaker III (c. 500CE - c. 750CE) to Pueblo II period (c. 900 CE – c. 1100 CE).  The site revealed hundreds of pit dwellings, multi-storied structures, a central courtyard, kivas, irrigation for agriculture and high quality ceramics.  After documenting and photographing the site, the ruins were covered over; all that can be seen now are piles of rubble, stones sticking out of the ground which denote the outline of structures, pottery shards and simple tools made from agate for cutting and scraping.




A prized possession, if you can find a copy, is "Archaeology of Alkali Ridge, Southeastern Utah" by John Otis Brew (published 1946) which is basically the only proof of existence of the ruins from the photographs and drawings.

In 1964, Alkali Ridge (covering an area of 70 square miles) was designated a National Landmark; on August 12, 1965, at 3:00 PM, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), other Federal agencies, local and state officials held a dedication ceremony at the Alkali Ridge National Historical Landmark.  Archaeologists from a number of western universities attended this ceremony; Dr. John 0tis Brew of the Pea-body Museum, Harvard University, who did the original archaeological scientific investigations on Alkali Ridge, was the keynote speaker.  In 2013, an unusual pottery, "Deadman Black on Red", was examined by University of Pennsylvania and Bristol-Meyers Squibb researchers and the cacao was discovered.

How to find this landmark:  From the Monticello Welcome Center on Route 191, travel south for 11.3 miles; turn onto Mustang Road (CR 207) just before mile marker 60.  Stay on CR 207 for 2.8 miles to the junction of CR 207 and CR 204 (Alkali Point Road); turn left onto CR 204 and the entrance is 1.4 miles on the westward side.

At the opening, you will see wood and wire fencing, but no gate and the small signs on the posts are blank; there is a shack beyond the opening.  Drive in near the shack, park and let your legs do the rest of the work for you.  Jenna and I walked in a half mile westward, found the central point of the dig site; we then did a half mile north and south from the central point; I guess you could call that a square half mile of hiking.  I'm going to let my photos do most of the story telling now...

The Central Dig Site

 

Stones Outline a Kiva

 

Rubble Piles, Pottery Shards, Agate Tools

 

 

 

Possible shard of Deadman Black on Red

 

Indented Pottery Shards

 

Cutting or Scraping Tool made from Agate

 

Now for an odd story, walking around the Ridge, a slight breeze blowing, clear sky and being able to see to the edges of the earth, or so it seemed; the Ridge is a serene place to visit.  On our way back to the SUV, Jenna exhibited a sudden odd behavior; she sat down against my legs and refused to let me continue walking forward, but her head was turned to allow her to look behind me at the area we had just left.  This went on for a good 10 minutes; every time I tried to move forward, she would purposely press herself against my legs and not allow me to walk; she kept looking back at the central dig site though.  Suddenly, she got up and walked back to the SUV with me to follow; I looked back, but saw no person or creature; then again, that doesn't mean that no one was there.  I did say it was a serene place to visit and who knows what people still reside there, even if just in spirit.

 

Mary Cokenour

Alkali Ridge - Ruins and ATV Trails

Good news, we found the entrance to the actual Alkali Ridge National Historical Landmark.  Bad news, I'm not going to write about it in this post.  Good news, I am going to tell you where to find more of the ruins, and also some ATV trails for you four wheelers. If you refer back to my first post about Alkali Point Road and the Ridge area, you'll see my map, and I've added a few details.


Once again, I'm starting this adventure from the junction of Mustang Road (CR 207) and Alkali Point Road (CR 204).  Since we found the cliff dwellings by a trail on Alkali Point Road, we figured they were located on the cliff walls off of Mustang Road.  Now we wanted to find these mesa top ruins we'd read about and needed to estimate a comparison between both roads.  That didn't go so well; between miles 1 to 3; the land is open for hiking, but the canyon is fenced off.  Miles 4 to 6 is all private land, so no hiking at all.  Remember those instructions from the "Visiting the Ancients" site I quoted in my first write up about this area; yeah, still laughing over that.

 




It wasn't until we reached mile 10 that we hit pay dirt; literally!  There is a graded gravel road leading down into the canyon and when you've traveled only 1.1 miles along it, to the north you can make out ruins in the cliff walls.

The big question is, "How do we get up to the mesa top from the gravel road?".  We drove on further and noticed that the road split into three separate trails.  Two of the trails dead end at pump jacks; the third trail goes past the oil company buildings and becomes ATV trail CR 265 which primarily ends at Perkins Road (CR 206) with a side trail here and there along the way.

So, back to the mesa top question; that's when Roy says to me suddenly, "Hey, I noticed a dirt trail that split off from the gravel road before we saw those ruins.  We traveled back to the split which is 3/10ths of a mile from when we first turned off Mustang Road and onto the gravel road.  ATVs and 4-wheel drive vehicles will have no problem with this trail, or the trails that branch off from it.  The first trail that branched off was at 1/10th of a mile, but it only looped back around to the main trail.  At 3/10ths of a mile, a trail went up a steep incline and then balanced out; we went as far as we could and walked out towards the canyon we could see beyond.  Oh what a sight to see, and Eureka!, we found the ruins we'd seen from the gravel road.

First the scenery of the mesa top; it is quite similar to an alien landscape.  Open areas may have piles of rubble and this is possibly what may be left from some of the original ancestral ruins.  Pottery shards and cutting/scraping tools made from agate can be easily found; be careful to watch where you're stepping, so they don't get broken or crushed.

View of the gravel road

The climb down to the ruins is not difficult; watch out for loose sand and stones though.  The walls of this granary are completely intact; the opening in the rocks at the side of the granary allows you a further look inside than just the window.

Now here's a mystery we encountered; carvings on the wall that simply looked like lines going this way and that.  We are clueless as to whether they were made by the ancestral Puebloans, or is it vandalism by "modern day would-be artists"?

I cannot resist taking photos of the local plant life; delicate plants and flowers thriving in sandy soil and amongst the boulders along with the cacti.

Silvery Townsendia (sunflower family)

Woodsia ilvensis (rusty cliff fern0

Wooly Marigold (aster family)

Prickly Pear Cactus with Red Bloom

When I do my next write up on the Alkali Ridge and Canyon area, it will be about the National Landmark itself.

Mary Cokenour

Alkali Point and the Ridge Historical Landmark.

This adventure took us a good part of the day, namely because the Alkali Ridge Historical Landmark is difficult to find. Oh, it's listed on maps, but good luck getting specific directions to the site, and there are no signs indicating its location. These were the directions that one online site (Visiting the Ancients) gave to find the ruins, "Access is via a well traveled gravel road suitable for lower clearance two-wheel drive cars (watch out for oil field trucks) and several 4-wheel drive stem roads accessible with high clearance four-wheel drive vehicles. The 4-wheel drive roads on Alkali Ridge also offer some decent mountain bike rides (another way to get from site to site). For the driver, you need only to park any place on the mesa, walk into the trees, or out into one of the clear areas, and start looking around."

There are obvious problems with these directions: #1 - Which gravel road is being referred to, Alkali Point Road (CR 204) or Mustang Road (CR 207)?  The historical landmark is located within a canyon between these two roads; from Alkali Point the cliff dwellings can be viewed from across the canyon.  #2 - To get to the mesa top ruins, the instructions state to "park any place"...really?  Could the writer of "Visiting the Ancients" be a little more specific at all?  What we have figured out is that the mesa top ruins are both sides of both roads (Alkali Point walking westward, Mustang Road walking eastward), and we believe we have an estimate of where to park to find them.  #3 - While the two main roads are graded gravel and cars would make it over them; the access roads down into the canyon are 4-wheel drive friendly only.  Also, many of the dirt roads end at fenced in private property which you don't discover until you've traveled down them.

Best to get started at the beginning which is at the junction of Mustang and Alkali Point Roads; by the way, the Alkali is only about 14 miles in total distance before reaching Perkins Road (CR 206).  The road itself is mainly graded gravel, some areas flat with sage brush or dense with trees; those times when a section opens up between the trees is when you get to see the amazing surprises in the distance.



The first two miles traveling south we explored several dirt trails leading to the west; only to be disappointed by a wooden and wire fence with no trespassing and private property signs posted.  At mile 2.2 we went off on a trail that lead eastward and ended up at a beautiful primitive area with signs of it being a camping area as well.  Climbing over the huge rock formation at the end was sheer fun, as well as examining the way the elements carved out the stone itself.



Cave used for camping.

 

 

 

No sight of any ruins though, so the search continued to the 3.3 mile point where the road split and we went down the trail leading west once again.  While it started out as graded dirt for the first two miles, it soon changed to an unmaintained rough road not suitable for cars, but fine for 4 wheel drive vehicles.  There is a sort of "traffic circle" with the second trail leading to oil tanks and equipment; the first trail, however, went on for three miles before leading off down to the right hand side.  Only a couple of miles down we stopped to check out one series of rock formations that looked so awesome.  At the far upper right hand corner, it looks as if a pig is kissing a crocodile; or is the pig about to become the croc's dinner?

Pig and Crocodile

Anyway, it was at eight miles down that we began seeing the cliff dwellings along the Alkali Ridge walls; the only way to walk to them was to park and do a bit of hiking.  We thought about driving through the dried river beds, but were concerned about getting stuck in the deep sand.  I've included a few photos of just the walls themselves, so you can see how easily it is to miss the ruins with all the cracks, crevices and caves.

Welcome to the Alkali Ridge Historical Landmark, placed on the National Register in 1964, which are fine examples of the earliest forms of Puebloan architecture (c. 900 CE – c. 1100 CE).  Pottery found in this area was sent to the University of Pennsylvania; cacao residue within proved that the ancestral people of that era were using chocolate even before the Aztec of Mexico.  The "cacao pottery" was not of the typical "black design on white base", but rather "black design on red", or better known as "Deadman Black on Red"; the sandstone coming from Deadman Canyon.  The pottery is currently included in "Chocolate - The Exhibition" at the Natural History Museum of Utah, located in Salt Lake City, Utah.   Most likely, indication signs are missing due to the locals not wishing the area to be visited by "outsiders", but this exhibit is drawing attention and the curious will be coming.

This road is also the home of petroleum and gas extraction; it ends at the 8.5 mile mark at a beautifully primitive area which has been clearly used for camping.







Backtracking to Alkali Point Road, we headed on south towards Perkins Road which would take us either to Blanding, or towards Montezuma Canyon Road (CR 146).  At mile 4.1, the east side of the wooded area opened up to this amazing vista; a glance at the map indicated this was Devil Mesa.  I noticed a large straight structure sticking upwards on the side of the mesa, so pulling out the zoom lens...well what do you know, I found the devil himself residing right here in San Juan County.  The structure is a pinnacle which has a "potbellied" middle and a very discernible head atop a neck, with horns pertruding out of the "skull".

The "Devil" of Devil Mesa

At mile 5.3 is the unmarked Bradford Canyon Road (CR 202) which I've already told you is an ATVer's paradise road.  As we got closer to Perkins Road though, another section of wooded area opened up to the west; we got an amazing view of the Alkali Ridge with the Bears Ears in the far distance.  I will never ever get enough of our blue sky!

...and while this should have been named "All Roads Lead to Montezuma Canyon - Alkali Point Road" because that is where we ended up heading to, I wanted to draw your attention to the Alkali Ridge Historical Landmark.  So, find the ruins and then head on up to Salt Lake City to see the pottery exhibit, or vice versa; either way you will have a most awesome adventure.

Mary Cokenour