Picketwire Canyonlands

Rating: 
Round Trip Distance: 12.5 - 18.9 miles
Difficulty: Moderate
Skill level:
Elevation: 4307 - 4646 feet
Cellphone: 0 bars
Time: 4 hrs.
Trailhead: Corral/Withers Canyon
Fee: none
Attractions: Dinosaur tracks, Spanish mission/cemetery

Picketwire Canyon is located in the Comanche National Grassland south of the town of La Junta in southeastern Colorado. The canyon shows signs of habitation for thousands of years by archaic Indians and more recently by Spanish settlers. The trail through the canyon passes several Spanish homesites as well as the remains of the Dolores Mission and Cemetery. Continuing a little further past the mission leads to the largest dinosaur trackway in North America, located along the banks of the Purgatoire River, known as the Purgatoire River or Picketwire Canyonlands Dinosaur Track site.

Doc Holliday's Grave

Rating: 
Round Trip Distance: 1 mile
Difficulty: Easy - moderate
Elevation: 5890 - 6131 feet
Cellphone: 3-5 bars
Time: 45 mins.
Trailhead: Pioneer Cemetery
Fee: none
Attractions: Doc Holiday and Kid Curry graves

John Henry 'Doc' Holliday is buried in the Linwood Pioneer Cemetery on a hillside overlooking the town of Glenwood Springs, Colorado. Doc Holliday is best known for his involvement with Wyatt Earp, in the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, in Tombstone, Arizona but he had travelled to Glenwood Springs in hopes that the mineral water would provide some relief to his tuberculosis. The body of Kid Curry, an outlaw from the days of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, is also interned at the cemetery. The town of Glenwood Springs now owns the cemetery and maintains the foot trail leading to it.

Wetherill Cemetery

Rating: 
Round Trip Distance: 0.3 miles
Difficulty: Easy
Elevation: 6120 - 6136 feet
Cellphone: 0 bars
Time: 15 mins.
Trailhead: Pueblo del Arroyo
Fee: $8/vehicle
Attractions: Historic cemetery, petroglyphs

The Wetherill Cemetery is located in the Chaco Culture National Historical Park in northwestern New Mexico. Richard Wetherill, an amateur archaeologist who was credited with the discovery of the Cliff Palace ruin in Mesa Verde, had a homestead in Chaco Canyon that encompassed the Pueblo Bonito, Chetro Ketl and Pueblo del Arroyo great houses. He operated a trading post at the Pueblo Bonito site. Whether by hook or by crook the land passed to the government and became part of the newly created Chaco Canyon National Monument in 1907.

Homolo'vi Sunset Cemetary

Rating: 
Round Trip Distance: 1 mile
Difficulty: Easy
Elevation: 4872 - 4908 feet
Cellphone: 2-4 bars
Time: 30 mins.
Trailhead: Homolovi State Park Visitor Center
Fee: $7/vehicle
Attractions: Pioneer Mormon Cemetery

The Sunset Cemetery is located in the Homolovi State Park near Winslow, Arizona. A short trail leads to the site which is an early Mormon pioneer cemetery with gravestones dating back to the late 1800's. The cemetery sits on a hill overlooking the Little Colorado River where the pioneers were endeavoring to build a settlement named Sunset Fort. The fort was one of four such settlements being built in the area by the pioneers that were sent to the area by Brigham Young in 1876. Brigham City was one of the other sites located on the opposite side of the river while Obed and Joseph City were being established further upstream toward the present day city of Holbrook.