Queen Valley Pictograph Boulder - Joshua Tree National Park
I’d read about, and seen pictures of, a large boulder out in the backcountry, near the base of Queen Mountain and decided I wanted to find it. You’re probably thinking, “You’re nuts. There are hundreds, if not thousands of large boulders in Queen Valley. And one looks much the same as another, so what’s the big deal?” That’s a fair question.
What makes this boulder different from all the others strewn about the area are the pictographs hidden inside a huge concavity on one side of the boulder. After considerable searching online, looking for location hints in descriptions, comparing images of the rock with possible landmarks in the background, I was able to narrow down the location to this general area:
But that still left a lot of ground to cover and approximately 144,587 rocks to inspect. Well, I had the whole day….
There’s no trace of a trail to the Pictograph Boulder, it’s pretty much just cross-desert hiking. Pure Exploration. We parked at a small parking area at the end of O’Dell Road, which is also the starting point for hiking the trail to Queen Mountain and the Underground. After waymarking the parking lot, Murbachi (who is an actual person and who has a great 3D Joshua Tree National Park website with even more pictures than me) and I gathered up our gear and started hiking east. Time to start looking at boulders.
The terrain is fairly level and our path occasionally followed small washes. The weather had cooperated once again and provided us with temperatures in the low 70s and a clear blue sky. It was a perfect day for exploring.
There are many different types of “prickly pear” cactus to stumble upon along the way. On the left, the Grizzly. On the right, the Pancake. Many of the different types produce fruit that is edible, as are some of the paddles. I’ll stick with granola bars and chocolate chip cookies on my treks. And no matter how benign they appear, all cactus have an innate thirst for human blood.
After hiking about ½-mile, we approached the first of several rock piles we would encounter that morning. After carefully inspecting each one, no joy.
Skirting around its north side, the next rocky area was about ¼ mile ahead. In fact, there was a very large boulder that I thought could be the one we were looking for.
Alas, it was not. We continued hiking. And then, up ahead, there was another large boulder that I was sure would be the one.
But it wasn’t and we continued hiking.
There are some really interesting rocks in the area we hiked through and it seemed like in every direction, there were possible candidates for the Pictograph Boulder.
I was beginning to understand how the old-time prospectors must have felt, wandering about in search of tell-tale signs of gold. In fact, we passed by several spots where quartz veins poked up through the desert ground and splashed the surrounding area with hundreds of shards of white quartz that gleamed in the sun.
But we weren’t looking for gold this trip, so we ignored the quartz and continued inspecting rocky overhangs and hollowed-out boulders.
Egads.
And then, Eureka. The Pictograph Boulder is big and one side has the familiar scooped out concavity that you see in so many monzogranite rocks at J Tree. Walking into the mini shelter, I looked up and saw the pictographs. There are quite a few and most are very faded. A couple interesting ones were painted on small rocks that extruded from the surface of the main boulder. One looked to me like a ladybug. There are a number of straight lines and other shapes. A sun burst was still very plain, as was an arrow that pointed up.
Like most of the treks we’ve undertaken out in the ruff of the park, we saw no other explorers. Just sand, pointy and sharp things, rocks and Joshua Trees. While resting in the shade of the huge boulder, I couldn’t help but wonder about the Indians who spent time here and created these pictographs. What do they represent. Was it just something to do while resting before continuing on their journey? I’ll never know, but I’m glad they took the time to create them, as it gives me a great reason to head out into the desert to see what I can find.
Heading back to the truck didn’t take as long as finding the pictograph boulder, and there were still sights to see. Sometimes things look totally different on the way back.
If you’re lucky enough to find the Queen Valley Pictograph Boulder, or any other Native American site in the park, please be respectful of these special places.
Feel free to leave comments/suggestions in the section below. Happy trails.
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