Hawk Springs birds

While at Hawk Springs I was able to catch this Great Egret while kayaking. Had to zoom all the way and then crop the image.

This one I walked down the shore the last morning I was there. He didn't want me too close and this is the best one. -

Here is Mary Lou and her dog Maya.

This is post 262 and I have 3 more months to go to accomplish my year of photos. I am pulling from the past sometimes as this one was early Sept. The goal to again get interested in photography has been somewhat achieved.  Mostly in getting out there and taking photos. Also, improving on quality by just trying to keep it interesting. Hey troops, I'm getting tired of file management.

Pole Creek Campground

Another road trip, this time to Vedauwoo.  Pole Creek Campground had a bar across the road so we walked down it. Beautiful fall colors and the variation in them with reds, yellow and orange this year is a wonderful.

And this must be the reason for closing the campground! Mary Lou can touch each end of the logs. Nice that you can walk through.

And on the ground - freshly fallen leaves.

And then in another section of Vedauwoo...totally dead evergreen trees.

Pollinator

Probably a yellow jacket, too skinny for a bee. There were very busy jumping from flower to flower at the park.

Aspen again

These were taken a week ago at Lake Owen.

Cemetery tour at Leadville

How do you eat and elephant? One bite at a time. Started to format my SD cards from this summer and found one I had not put on the computer. This is Roger Pretti our tour guide at the 147 acre Leadville cemetery. Interesting how some of the graves were fenced or defined like the one above.

This was not a cemetery with a maintained lawn and a lot of the older graves stones had fallen or weathered so you could not read them. While doing the tour another worker came up to let us know that a bear and her cub were down by the creek. Roger continued on, not too concerned.

There were a lot of miners and loggers buried and this stone represents his life.

Oh and "the" John Wilkes Booth is buried here. Well maybe, as Roger said.

Last day of summer

Once again playing around with my spoon to see what reflections I could capture.

Light

With this photo, the composition worked but the colors in it did not. Time of day shot? It was taken at high noon with  what I call tourist light and clouds kept interfering. Sometimes you photograph what you can where you are. I decided that I liked it better as a black and white.

End of summer

The next competition at camera club is macro, so off I went to the park to take some photos. This was taken on the last day of summer and our weather has turned chilly but not cold. Oh well winter is coming.

Down a Wyoming road

On my way out from Hawk Springs on the wash-board road, I stopped and grabbed this photo. This is typical Wyoming...lots of open space. Wanted less road, but could not get the composition I wanted with flowers in it.

Over the mountain from Apsen

This was taken at Taylor Reservoir and on the other side of the mountain was Aspen and Maroon Bells. And again clouds and a little smoke.

Lake Marie

Another dark and rainy day at Lake Marie in Snowy Range.

Road trip to Owens Lake

Changing aspens in the mountains. Mary Lou and I went to Medicine Bow National Forest scouting new campsites for next year. Colors were great, sun was in and out and wind was blowing but was a great day.

The photo above I had good sun, and the one below, I couldn't stop the car and get out fast enough before the clouds muted the colors.

This is Owens lake and I the fish were jumping.

 This area had a lot of beetle kill and on the far side of the lake (not shown) was the remnants of a forest fire last year.  In other sections as we drove towards Rob Roy Res. there were pockets of green trees and no beetle kill. They were higher elevation.

Down a road made public

While at Hawk Springs Carol and Steve took us down a canyon that had recently been opened to the public. I handed my camera to Delita and all 5 ft 2 of me stood next to this huge tree - and I had to climb up on the fallen branch to get there.

The rancher that owns the land had made a beautiful rustic park along one section. Oh, and  mountain lions live up in those cliffs.

Water drops again

Once again I set up in the bathroom so I could have water drops dripping from a plastic bag over head. The top one has a red acetate sheet that reflected the color and the bottom two just had white. Blue color is from the camera white balance and a flash. These were done for Camera Club since I could not find the original ones after my desktop computer crashed.  

Tasty Peaches

This time of year we are treated with the wonderful tree ripened peaches from Western Colorado. This stand was just around the corner from my house on the weekends, but last weekend was his last.

Oh, sunshine

Finally the sun peaked through to shine on some of the mountains. This is the view out my motor home window at Lizard Pass.

View from the top

The first two photos are from the top of Imogene Pass.

This one is from the gondola looking down on Telluride. Again lots of haze from smoke.

Another view of Telluride, but this one from the top of the pass. More smoke haze.

Yellow Mountain Range

Knowing what mountains surrounded us was always a challenge. The last photo shows the panorama with our camping spot at the Lizard Head Pass area outside of Telluride. These mountains lit up with the evening sun as long as there wasn't clouds.- but as had lots of days with clouds- or forest fire smoke.

The mountain below could be Vermilion Peak at 13,894-- almost a  14-teener. From my Colorado map, peaks that were also in the area: Grisly Peak, 13,738; Rolling Mountain 13,693 and Sultan Mountain 13,370. We were camped at 10,330 elevation. Since we had been camping at 9 and 10 thousand feet for almost 2 months, the elevation did not cause me major breathing problems until I started up hill. Riding my bike up hill didn't happen- had to walk it up the hill. 

Those white spots in the lower right corner of the photo below are some of our rigs. The road getting in was bad and I bent my automatic step that is behind the back tires. 

On reviewing earlier posts this one is similar to the August 23 one and I am having a hard time keeping up with this labor intensive process!

Just a weed

This is a milk weed that was along the road that we were walking. Bees love them, they are pretty and when they go to seed they also make good photography.

Hawk Springs Reservoir

Camping last week at Hawk Springs and this was the view across the lake and a touch a fall in the cottonwood trees.

While looking across the lake I could not see this round building- another surprise with zooming in on my digital photo.

We were treated with a double rainbow one evening.

Mushroom Festival in Telluride

This is a continuation from the previous downtown Telluride post that I did before I went off to camp again with the singles group in Cheyenne. The best camping seems to have little or no cell and internet service.
The above mushrooms are Toxic causing a GI irritant.

 These pretty mushrooms are also toxic-- Ibotenic acid - muscimol- (which means nothing to me)

These 3: 1st one: Edible  -middle one:  Edible for some, diarrhea for some  and the last, Edible
After looking at all the mushrooms, I will stick to buying them at the store.

Below shows one table of the different types of mushrooms.