Round Trip Distance: 0.2 miles
Difficulty: Easy
Elevation: 4972 feet
Cellphone: 0-2 bars
Time: 30 mins.
Trailhead: MM 31.1
Fee: none
Attractions: ruin, petroglyphs
The Covered Wagon Ruin is located along Montezuma Creek between Blanding and Monticello, Utah. The site consists of a remnant wall from a small ruin and a large surface with an assortment of petroglyphs. One of the images looks like either a covered wagon or perhaps a stagecoach.
There are multiple ways to get to the Covered Wagon Ruin depending upon your direction of travel. If coming from the north you can turn off of US-191 5 miles south of Monticello onto the unmarked graveled Montezuma Creek Road, CR-187, and follow it south for 31.1 miles. According to Google Maps somewhere along the way CR-187 becomes CR-146.
The easy to spot site is at the end of a short side road about 100 yards or so from the main road.
The ruin itself is a little peculiar in that the area that it encloses doesn't have a flat surface that would have made it more suitable for storage or human occupation. Perhaps the original ruin extended out over the level ground and provided more useful space.
Most of the petroglyphs appear to be Ute in origin.
There are some older human like images that we outlined in white. When the horses and what looks like a mule were added they were overlaid upon several of them.
The covered wagon is the most interesting part of the panel. One would suppose that these are Mormon immigrants or settlers. If that is the case there is a good chance that this encounter was recorded in someones journal.
It looks like two people are riding on the horse in the upper left and one is wearing a cowboy hat. That along with what looks like a mule would suggest that these too were settlers.
A geometric design on the same boulder might be a map or the layout of a homestead.
