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“Ventana Cave, Rock Art & Tohono O’odham Children’s Shrine”
February 18, 2017 @ 6:00 am - 4:00 pm
On Saturday, February 18, 2017 from 6 am to 4 pm, Old Pueblo Archaeology Center will sponsor a car-caravan educational tour with archaeologist Allen Dart departing from Tucson at the Park & Ride parking lot at I-10 and Ruthrauff Rd. at 6 am (northeast corner of the I-10 westbound Frontage Road at Exit 252) or at 7 a.m. on the east (front) side of the McDonalds Restaurant at 3160 N. Toltec Rd. in Eloy (accessible from I-10 Exit 203). Fee $40 ($32 for Old Pueblo Archaeology Center and Pueblo Grande Museum Auxiliary members; no charge for members or employees of the Tohono O’odham Nation). Old Pueblo Archaeology Center offers this early-morning car-caravan tour to visit the Ventana Cave National Historic Landmark site and a Native American sacred site on the Tohono O’odham Nation. The Arizona State Museum’s 1940s excavations in Ventana Cave, led by archaeologists Emil W. Haury and Julian Hayden, found evidence for human occupation extending from historic times back to around 10,000 years ago. The cave, which actually is a very large rockshelter, also contains pictographs, petroglyphs, and other archaeological features used by Native Americans for thousands of years. After visiting the cave we will stop at a Native American petroglyphs site and the “Children’s Shrine,” a Tohono O’odham sacred site where legend says Tohono O’odham children were offered to the waters to stop a great flood that threatened to engulf the world. Tour leaves Tucson at 6 a.m. to ensure the pictographs can be seen in the best morning light. Fees will benefit the Tohono O’odham Hickiwan District’s efforts to develop a caretaker-interpretive center at Ventana Cave, and the nonprofit Old Pueblo Archaeology Center’s education programs.
Reservations and prepayment required by Wednesday February 15: 520-798-1201 or info@oldpueblo.org.
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