Bakersfield Life

A rockin' good trip

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      Have you ever wanted to step back in time? I mean way back, say 16,000 years ago? No, you don’t need H.G. Wells’ time machine. Just hop in your car, grab your walking stick, your sense of adventure and visit any one of three rock art locations within a few hours’ drive from Bakersfield.
      What is rock art? David Whitley, a Kern County resident and one of North America’s foremost experts on prehistoric art and the people who created it, says, “The two most common kinds of rock art are pictographs, or rock paintings, and petroglyphs, or rock engravings. Pictographs were created with paints made by mixing ground mineral earths (like ocher or kaolin) or charcoal with a liquid, such as animal blood or water. These paints were applied with the fingers or with a brush made from the tip of a tail of a small animal. Petroglyphs were made with a stone cobble, using this hammer through the dark coating of rock varnish on the outside of the rock, to create a design in the lighter heart rock exposed below.”
      When you see rock art, you have to wonder about the people who created it and what they were trying to say through their symbols. For years it was thought the engravings and drawings were made by ancient Celtic and Libyan mariners or even extraterrestrials, but in fact the artists were American Indians. The symbols often depict rain, a human shooting an arrow at a big horn sheep, a feather, various geometric designs, etc. Whitley says they are metaphoric symbols and generally have nothing to do with what seems like the obvious translation.
     Archaeologists didn’t pay much attention to rock art until the 1980s. Now, it is widely studied and many of the sites have become attractions that draw tourists, history buffs and photographers.
      One of the largest and most exciting rock art sites in North America, perhaps the world, is Little Petroglyph Canyon, considered to be a national treasure. Located on Wild Horse Mesa in the Coso Mountain Range (China Lake), this spectacular concentration of petroglyphs was made by Numic-speaking Shoshone, Northern and Southern Paiute, and the Kawaiisu peoples. “Numic shamans traveled from at least as far away as Utah to conduct vision quests in the Cosos. Their petroglyphs are dominated by depictions of bighorn and mountain sheep, the special spirit helpers of rain shamans,” says Whitley. Chronometric dating suggests some of the etchings may be 19,000 years old, while others appear to be 1,000 to 1,500 years old. To the shamans, the Cosos were a place of great power — a place where they could acquire the power to control weather.
     Little Petroglyph Canyon is accessible only by escorted tours booked through Maturango Museum in Ridgecrest. It’s a good 45-minute drive from the museum but once you reach the site, it’s just a short walk to the canyon entrance. There are bathrooms, drinking water and picnic tables near the parking lot.  
     Closer to Bakersfield, at the eastern edge of Tehachapi in Sand Canyon, is the Tomo-Kahni (meaning “village”) State Historic Park. Here, the rock art features pictographs, painted within the last few hundred years by the Kawaiisu. The paintings are on the walls and ceiling of a cavelike dwelling that the Kawaiisu refer to as “Teddy Bear Cave.” Whitley says a grizzly bear “is said to live in a crack in the rock at the site and is believed to emerge from the crack to frighten away visitors who approach the site without proper respect.”
     Though a small site with fewer than a dozen paintings, it is still very much worth the effort. It is also only accessible by escorted tours booked through Tomo-Kahni State Historic Park. The walking tour is moderately strenuous and takes between two to three hours to complete.
      Fifty miles west of Bakersfield, via Highway 58, between McKittrick and Atascadero off Soda Lake Road, are the Carrizo Painted Rock Pictographs. At one time this was the most spectacular pictograph site in North America. Sadly, the paintings were vandalized and degraded many years ago but recent conservation efforts have improved them. Whitley recommends you visit this site after visiting other sites to fully appreciate the detail still evident. Painted Rock is a smooth horseshoe-shaped marine, sandstone rock formation that sits on the floor of the Carrizo Plain. The paintings were created by yet another tribe, the Chumash.
     From the parking lot, Painted Rock is a quick quarter-mile walk on a developed path. From March 1 to July 15 the site can only be accessed by guided tour; the remainder of the year it is open to the public, weather and road conditions permitting.
     Whichever site you visit, you can’t help but be in awe. The sheer age of these rock art symbols is staggering. And if you’re very quiet you just might hear a lone shaman chanting to the great spirit as he etches his vision into the rock for future time travelers to ponder.

If you go
Little Petroglyph Canyon
Call Maturango Museum in Ridgecrest for tour dates and fee information. Spring reservations fill up quickly. 619-375-6900 or maturango.org

Tomo-Kahni State Historic Park
Call 661-822-3720 for tour dates and fee information.

Painted Rock
Visit: http://blm.gov/ca/st/en/fo/bakersfield/Programs/carrizo/goodwin.html for detailed driving directions and hours of the Goodwin Education Center, where tours can be booked.

Books
“A Guide to Rock Art Sites, Southern California and Southern Nevada,” by David S. Whitley, available at Books & Crannies in Tehachapi

“Following the Shaman’s Path, A Walking Guide to Little Petroglyph Canyon Coso Range, California,” by David S. Whitley, available at Maturango Museum in Ridgecrest
 
“Cave Paintings & the Human Spirit,” by David S. Whitley, available at Books & Crannies in Tehachapi.
 
“Rock Drawings of the Coso Range,” by Campbell Grant, James W. Baird, J. Kenneth Pringle, available at Maturango Museum in Ridgecrest