Off The Beaten Tracks
Sep. 23rd, 2021 03:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
waitingmanDay 14 & we're still in Colorado. First time in a little while that we've been in the same State for more than a day...
Sept 24. Monday – Boulder & The Rocky Mountains
After a breakfast of Gary-cooked crepes, we were off into the mountains again for more peaks & golden aspen, but this time a little southwest (Help!! We're going backwards!!) of where we were yesterday in Rocky Mountains National Park. Today we roamed part of the Indian Peaks Wilderness area with more of those rusty golden aspen woods, along with some old mining towns, shacks & shafts
Then out to the Moffat railway tunnel through the mountains to break up the nature-fest. When we arrived, we roamed the trackside area, photographing the surrounding scenery, then Julia convinced me to lie on the tracks for a photo, while Gary photographed her photographing me. More about that picture later... Even though we were clearly breaking the law by trespassing on Amtrak-owned land, there were a couple of track workers who didn’t seem to mind, as long as we didn’t start tearing up the rails, or playing silly buggers, or leaving anything on or near the lines. Which, of course, we didn’t, just took a few shots & went on our way, leaving nothing but footprints, as the guidebooks always recommend. We also stopped at a rail crossing to photograph a train that came out of the tunnel with a blaring of horns, along the track that I’d been lying on about fifteen minutes earlier. Again, more about that in a minute...
Lunch at a mountainside cafe, then more stunning scenery to the point of overload through the afternoon, including a trip through an old mining town that has found a second life by becoming a Cowboy movie-style gambling town... sort of how Las Vegas would have looked if it had been built in the 1850s. We also visited the town cemetery on top of the hill, with dates ranging from the early 1800s to 2006
On the way back into town, we stopped at a place where you could look down into Boulder & see a rain front looming over the town, or look west over the mountains for what became a colourful sunset
Back home to feed & be adored by the dogs, then a light dinner of chicken noodle soup & home-baked apple pie, the down to Gary’s den for him to process & post a few photos to Flickr, the site where we found each other a few years ago. He posted the shot of me on the rails, then took me through some of his processing techniques, some of which I’ll definitely be trying when we get home, even if he hasn’t quite convinced about using a tripod all the time – I still prefer to hold the camera, but we’ll see. Gary had a missed call from another mutual Flickr contact – Hadrian down in south-east Texas, so we called him back & talked for about twenty minutes. I was lucky to have Gary there, as Hadrian’s Texan accent was sometimes impenetrable, but Gary seemed to understand him & I just made agreeing noises if I wasn’t sure... It was good to put at least a voice to another Flickr friend
Then we checked Flickr to see if anyone had commented on the rail photo. Several people had, mostly other contacts of Gary’s whose comments were positive. There were also a couple of comments from strangers who were outraged & angry about our disrespect & disdain for both the railway & the law by being so stupid as to lie on the rails. One commenter wished I’d been run over... of which there had never been any danger, so I was sorry to have disappointed him, but more on this a bit later, because we then went to bed. Obviously we weren't going to lose any sleep over this...
Sept 24. Monday – Boulder & The Rocky Mountains
After a breakfast of Gary-cooked crepes, we were off into the mountains again for more peaks & golden aspen, but this time a little southwest (Help!! We're going backwards!!) of where we were yesterday in Rocky Mountains National Park. Today we roamed part of the Indian Peaks Wilderness area with more of those rusty golden aspen woods, along with some old mining towns, shacks & shafts
Then out to the Moffat railway tunnel through the mountains to break up the nature-fest. When we arrived, we roamed the trackside area, photographing the surrounding scenery, then Julia convinced me to lie on the tracks for a photo, while Gary photographed her photographing me. More about that picture later... Even though we were clearly breaking the law by trespassing on Amtrak-owned land, there were a couple of track workers who didn’t seem to mind, as long as we didn’t start tearing up the rails, or playing silly buggers, or leaving anything on or near the lines. Which, of course, we didn’t, just took a few shots & went on our way, leaving nothing but footprints, as the guidebooks always recommend. We also stopped at a rail crossing to photograph a train that came out of the tunnel with a blaring of horns, along the track that I’d been lying on about fifteen minutes earlier. Again, more about that in a minute...
Lunch at a mountainside cafe, then more stunning scenery to the point of overload through the afternoon, including a trip through an old mining town that has found a second life by becoming a Cowboy movie-style gambling town... sort of how Las Vegas would have looked if it had been built in the 1850s. We also visited the town cemetery on top of the hill, with dates ranging from the early 1800s to 2006
On the way back into town, we stopped at a place where you could look down into Boulder & see a rain front looming over the town, or look west over the mountains for what became a colourful sunset
Back home to feed & be adored by the dogs, then a light dinner of chicken noodle soup & home-baked apple pie, the down to Gary’s den for him to process & post a few photos to Flickr, the site where we found each other a few years ago. He posted the shot of me on the rails, then took me through some of his processing techniques, some of which I’ll definitely be trying when we get home, even if he hasn’t quite convinced about using a tripod all the time – I still prefer to hold the camera, but we’ll see. Gary had a missed call from another mutual Flickr contact – Hadrian down in south-east Texas, so we called him back & talked for about twenty minutes. I was lucky to have Gary there, as Hadrian’s Texan accent was sometimes impenetrable, but Gary seemed to understand him & I just made agreeing noises if I wasn’t sure... It was good to put at least a voice to another Flickr friend
Then we checked Flickr to see if anyone had commented on the rail photo. Several people had, mostly other contacts of Gary’s whose comments were positive. There were also a couple of comments from strangers who were outraged & angry about our disrespect & disdain for both the railway & the law by being so stupid as to lie on the rails. One commenter wished I’d been run over... of which there had never been any danger, so I was sorry to have disappointed him, but more on this a bit later, because we then went to bed. Obviously we weren't going to lose any sleep over this...
