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Petroglyph Series LbNA #15196

Owner:Donutz716 Contact
Plant date:May 21, 2005
Location:
City:Colchester
County:New London
State:Connecticut
Boxes:9
Found by: Team Rogue (2)
Last found:Sep 11, 2021
Status:FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF
Last edited:Dec 21, 2015
CLUES REVISED 7/25/08

Bridge is located on Comstock Bridge Road right off of Route 16 - Salmon River State Forest. The trail begins at the Comstock covered Bridge. You will be hiking on the Connecticut Blue Dot Trail for this series. There is a 2-mile connecting trail from the Comstock Bridge to Day Pond South loop, which is also 2 miles. The entire hike is 6 miles. Visualize it like a lollipop. You will be walking up the stick, then around the lollipop, then back down the stick again. Just to mention, there are 9 boxes and the last one contains the logbook. Bring clues for "Covered Bridge and Verdi plus Halloween Surprise" which you will find in East Hampton, Middlesex County.

Petroglyph – A carving or line drawing on rock, especially one made by prehistoric people. - greek: petro meaning rock, and glyph meaning drawing or engraving.


PArk your car and cross the bridge. Take a sharp turn to the left and walk down to the water. The blue trail will be to your right. Continue straight with the river on your left and soon the trail will veer gradually to the right then take a steep climb. Once at the top, the trail will intersect with a wide dirt trail. Bear left. This is a continuation of the blue dot trail. Soon you will enter a clearing that overlooks the river on your left. Continue about half way on the trail at this overlook and you will see a little path to your right. Step up and walk beyond the 2 sister tree to a ravine. On the northern side look right and wedged between 2 boulders will be HEALING HANDS.

HEALING HANDS
The hand is found very frequently in rock art. The reason is probably that it was the easiest to paint – you just got your hand all covered with pigment and “stamped” it on the rock (the world’s first stamp?), or you held your hand against the rock and blew paint around it (the world’s first mask?). It symbolizes healing and helping, and is the most important tool we humans have.


Keep following the trail and it will eventually start to climb again. Just before you get to the top, you will see a large log on the left side of the trail, pointing towards you. It will first appear to be 2 logs, one on top of another, but closer examination will confirm that it is only one. It is a fallen tree that was chained sawed to clear the trail. Take a reading of 260 degrees from the closest end to you, then take 22 steps to a large rock and find TURTLE.

TURTLE
Turtle plays an important role in Native American creation beliefs. In the beginning, everything was water and all the creatures were swimming about looking for a place to rest. Turtle, who was also swimming, invited the others to climb upon her back to be dry and safe. Thus Turtle became “Turtle Island” – synonymous with Mother Earth.


Continue on the trail. The blue dot trail veers to the right just before you reach the power lines. If you reach the power lines, you’ve gone too far. The trail becomes narrower now. You will walk through Mountain Laurel groves, and then the trail will start to ascend. When you are almost at the top, you will see a very large flat rock (6 to 8 ft long), close to the ground hugging the left side of the trail. Take a reading of 160 degrees and walk 8 steps to another flat rock. Go to the east side and find MOTHER TO BE.

MOTHER TO BE
This is a graphic representation of expectant motherhood. These two probably already have a relationship going as they go about life’s daily adventures, awaiting their “big day”.


Continue on your way, passing a stonewall on the left. Keep walking and you will start to descend, then a stonewall on the right. Then there’s a short ascension. Once you reach the top, there will be a tree with a blue dot. Take a reading of 60 degrees, take 20 steps to a four sister tree to find RABBIT.

RABBIT
Rabbits represent watchfulness and resourcefulness. Because they are prey for just about everything, they must be clever and use their wits to survive. This is a Jackrabbit – very common in the Southwest. If they are very resourceful, they can grow to be almost the size of a medium size dog, and they are amazingly fast.


Continuing on, you will cross 2 small footbridges, then come to a T intersection (you are leaving the stick and starting your trek around the lollipop now) – go right and continue on the blue dot trail. As soon as you cross another footbridge, count 19 steps along the trail to a blue dotted oak tree on the left side of the trail. (revision 7/25/08 - the blue blaze has been covered with black paint.) You will see a split rock to the left of the tree. Go to the rock and take a reading of 10 degrees and walk 6 steps to VISION QUEST.

VISION QUEST
Part of the Right of Passage is the seeking of a vision, which will give you a direction for your life path. It used to mean fasting or going into seclusion in the desert until you started “seeing things”. This lady seems to be seeing stars or maybe those are her wishes for her future.


Go back to the trail and continue to Day Pond, follow the auto road to the left and walk over the causeway. Once you cross it, you will see the blue dot trail on the left of the road continuing on its path into the woods away from Day Pond. Be careful to watch for the blue dots now, because shortly the trail will take a left off the main path. Continuing, you will see a brook on the left side of the trail. When you get to the point that the trail is closest to the brook, you will see a 3 sister tree on the right side of the trail. From the east side of the tree, take a reading of 330 degrees and walk 11 steps. You should be standing on a rock. Look to the south side of it for HEARTLINE BEAR.

THE HEARTLINE BEAR
The “heartline” has a few different interpretations and usually shows up on a Bear or a Deer. We think it has to do with love – having a direct connection to someone’s heart. The Bear symbolizes strength and self-knowledge. Native American animal magic is often based upon the animal’s behavior and the Bear’s habit of hibernation makes it seem like he spends a lot of time in introspection and solitude. Hence, he would know himself very well.


Continue on the trail, crossing under power lines. You will come to a point on the trail, where the trail takes you directly over the top of a large rock outcropping. When you reach the highest most point of the outcropping, take a reading of 280 degrees, and then walk 18 steps to KOKOPELLI.

KOKOPELLI
Kokopelli, the Flute Player shows up more than 250 times in the rock art of the Southwest and other areas of western United States. It is thought that this flute-playing hunchback was a traveling minstrel who went from village to village and was believed to bring fertility and abundance with his music. In the past few years, he has become so popular that he has replaced the howling coyote as the most well known symbol of the Southwest.


Keep following the trail until you see an old stonewall style foundation on the left side of the trail. (The foundation is adjacent to a rectangular stonewall that appears to define a nice rectangular yard from a bygone era.) At the point where the trail intersects with a dirt bike trail - which merges from the right, go right on that dirt bike trail. (If you come to a T intersection, you’ve gone too far.) As you walk up a slight hill on the dirt bike trail, count 33 steps to the beginning of another stonewall style foundation on the right. Continue on the trail to the far end of the foundation wall. With your back to the tree at the far corner, count 4 steps walking along the wall, towards the direction that you came from, to find LIZARD. (Be watchful for Jack in the Pulpit and Indian Cucumber in the area.)

LIZARD
The lizard will detach its own tail to get out of a jam, thus leaving trouble behind. For this reason, the lizard symbolizes “letting go” of baggage and getting on with one’s life.


Go back to the blue dot trail, continue to the T intersection, and go left – making sure to follow the blue dots. After walking under the power lines, you will come to the intersection of the Day Pond South loop and the Comstock Bridge intersecting trail. (You have finished your lollipop and are about to go back down the stick.) Take the right, following the sign pointing out the path to the Comstock Bridge. When you have walked through a stonewall and start to descend, stop at the 2 sister tree on the right side of the trail. From the tree, look to the right and you will see a rock outcropping. From the trail take 23 steps along the base of the outcropping to find LIFE PATH.

LIFE PATH
This symbol comes from the Tohono O’odham in Southern Arizona and Northern Mexico. Originally it symbolized the secret path the Creator took to his hidden home beneath the mountain peak, but it is more commonly described as the Life Path. The design is well suited to this interpretation because it has no shortcuts, no dead ends, and the entire path must be followed to complete the journey


Go back to the trail and continue in the same direction you’ve been going, following the blue dot trail to return to your car.

Special thanks to my good friend, Murph, for inspiring me to carve this series and also to Antiboxer2, my best friend and husband, who helped me plant and write the clues.