PEOPLE SUCK!!! This is a favorite destination of ours and the only way you can get to these petroglyphs is off road. If we can't keep people in our own camp behaving themselves, there will be NO hope for keeping our trails open.
Petroglyphs Vandalized
HINKLEY • In the Black Mountain area, north of Hinkley, images that pre-date all modern art can be found chiseled into basalt rocks.
A favorite of ancient indigenous people for its dark color and ability to withstand the elements, these basalt rocks have been under recent continuous attack by vandals who threaten to destroy history one slab at a time.
“Some of these have been here, I would estimate, maybe several thousand years — maybe as long as 10,000 years,” Jim Shearer, archaeologist at the Barstow Bureau of Land Management, said about the rocks, known as “petroglyphs.”
Shearer said he gets complaints all the time from petroglyph enthusiasts about damage being done to sully the ancient art.
Vandals who travel long, bumpy roads to the petroglyphs’ secluded mountain locations — often in off-road vehicles — scratch personal messages on the rocks, attempt to cut images out of them or copy the images with damage-causing contraptions and, sometimes, even shoot at them with high-powered weapons.
“Damage has been going on for quite a while, but it seems to be getting more extensive,” Shearer said. “In some cases it seems to be professionals going out there.”
Read the whole article here:
http://www.desertdispatch.com/news/hinkley-13750-petroglyphs-vandalized.html
