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Sears Point and Painted Rocks Petroglyphs, and Gatlin Hohokam Site Tour
December 9, 2017 @ 10:00 am - 4:30 pm
TOUR FULL – WAITING LIST STARTED. On Saturday, December 9, 2017, archaeologist Dr. Aaron M. Wright will guide guests on a tour of Sears Point and Painted Rocks Petroglyphs, and the Gatlin Hohokam site. The tour group will meet at 10:00 am at Interstate 8, Exit 78 (Spot Road), approximately 39 miles west of Gila Bend, Arizona. Fee: $45 ($36 for Old Pueblo Archaeology Center and Pueblo Grande Museum Auxiliary members).
Tour leader Aaron Wright, a Preservation Archaeologist with Tucson’s Archaeology Southwest organization, has research interests in paleoclimatology, indigenous Southwest ritualism and religion, and rock art. He will lead us first to see the seemingly countless petroglyphs and geoglyphs (intaglios; ground sculptures) on Sears Point, the northwestern escarpment of the Sentinel Plain (a vast basaltic field dotted with low shield volcanoes) located along the lower Gila River between Gila Bend and Yuma, Arizona. Sears Point is renowned for its density of petroglyphs as well as their unique style attributed to the Patayan culture tradition (which is believed to be ancestral to contemporary Yuman- and O’odham-speaking communities). The site is adorned with thousands of petroglyphs, and several geoglyphs, and also is traversed by seemingly endless ancient trails. We’ll also get to see remnants of the South Gila Canal (a defunct irrigation venture from the 1880s) at and near Sears Point, after which we’ll caravan to the Painted Rocks petroglyphs site northwest of Gila Bend and the Gatlin Platform Mound site on the outskirts of Gila Bend, touring until around 4:30. Tour participants interested in having dinner together before returning home can reconvene at Sophia’s Mexican Restaurant in Gila Bend at 5 p.m.
Reservations and prepayment required by Wednesday, December 6: 520-798-1201 or info@oldpueblo.org.