Situated in the Beaver Dam Mountains Wilderness between Littlefield (Arizona) and St. George (Utah), the Da Vinci Panel is named after Leonardo da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man – the famous nude male figure with arms and legs in two superimposed positions.
The vertical panel, resembling a giant tablet leaning against the cliff, has approximately twenty petroglyphs.
The petroglyphs includes three snakes, various animals, human-like figures, ‘bear-clan’ symbols or paw prints and several indeterminate figues.
About 280m west of the Da Vinci Panel are a couple more petroglyphs on an isolated boulder.
About 90m north-east is Newspaper Rock, another fairly well-known rock art site.
Getting to the Da Vinci Panel
There are a couple of routes to the Da Vinci Panel and Newspaper Rock which start from both sides of the Interstate 15. Neither has a signposted or formal trail – but there are some social trails you can follow (taking care that they are going in the right direction)! Both trailheads start from a wide shoulders on the I-15 where it’s safe to park, and both routes are about 0.8miles (1.2km) one-way.
The “south bound trailhead” if you’re coming from St George is arguably a little easier, as you don’t need to cross the Virgin River. However, you do need to crawl under a barbed-wire fence from the parking area before heading away from the freeway towards the ridge.
I preferred starting from the “north bound trailhead“; the downside of this approach is you are following the freeway for about a 0.4 miles (600m) along a service trail, which is not too pleasant (you could also drive along this road – a 4WD is highly recommended).
As you near the freeway bridge over the Virgin River Gorge, the road ends and a rough hiking trail continues down into the valley. After passing though a gate the route towards the bridge.
The trail drops down into the gorge after crossing under the bridge, to reach the Virgin River. From the river onwards there are no obvious trails; you will need to cross the river along one of the shallow sections before ascending to the Da Vinci Panel.
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