Newspaper Rock State Historic Monument

Nestled into a corner of a deep canyon lies some of the most dramatic and mysterious pictographs easily accessible to any Southern Utah visitor. Left up to two centuries ago, Anasazi, Navajo, and Freemont tribes left these wild carvings into the face of a dark faceted rock face.

The monument itself is small, and best of all free! Located along the entrance road to the Needles District of Canyonlands National Park - the park is easy to find. Often there are native vendors set up selling everything from Southwestern style jewelry to decorated pots. A parking lot and a pit toilet are the only amenities available.

The pictographs are closely scratched and pecked into a large dark colored canyon wall - providing a dark canvas for the tan canvases. The images come in all varieties, with everything from animals (buffalo, pronghorn, and horses) to circular shapes and human like beasts with horns. One can spend hours staring at the intricate and often overlapping shapes wondering what the pictographs mean and why they were placed there thousands of years ago