A landscape photographer's tour

Keith's travels in the Colorado Rockies - September-October 2008

Ouray to Durango via Silverton

Along the million dollar highway

This photo-diary covers a driving tour around the Colorado Rockies in the Fall (September/October 2008).

Although my third visit to the state, it's actually the first time I've been in Colorado at this time of the year. A good year for the Fall colours.

There are also photo-journals on this site covering a 2006 trip to Colorado and two to the Pacific coast..

There are lots of excellent photo books by people who've had a bit more time to look round than I have, such as this one by John Fielder... (lots of places I didn't get to).

Since I'm not on my own, it's a bit more of a road trip and not quite so heavily phototgraphy oriented as before ;-) That said, I'm getting some excellent photos and look forward to creating some great new prints, black and white as well as colour.

Colorado is a great place for a vacation, or just a road trip round the state to photograph some of the scenery. If you've any questions about the hotels/inns/motels where I stayed, then please do feel free to drop me a line.

	Daily pages 27th Sept.: to Denver 28th Sept.: Estes Park 29th Sept.: Rocky Mountain National Park 30th Sept.: Grand lake to Steamboat Springs 1st Oct: Steamboat Lake 2nd Oct: Steamboat to Leadville 3rd Oct: Leadville to Aspen 4th Oct: Aspen and Castle Creek 5th Oct: Aspen to Ouray 6th Oct: Telluride
What's the weather like? National Weather Service radar Geological maps Webcams What are the roads like? (CO)	7th Oct: Durango via Silverton 8th Oct: Durango to Gunnison 9th Oct: Ohio Pass 10th Oct: Gunnison to Salida 11th Oct: Salida to Frisco 12th Oct: Loveland Pass 13th Oct: Via Mt Evans (almost) 14th Oct: Flying home

The road (US 550) rises sharply out of Ouray

ouray overlook

You can see it's in a quite steep valley

us 550 - million dollar highway

After a few miles of this it flattens out, but not before Karen likened it more to a rollercoaster ride (and I was driving carefully ;-) I guess sometimes it's better to actually be at the wheel of the car

A stream further up shows one of the big problems in this mineral rich area.

Pollution from mine workings has stained the river brown. There are lots of special ponds and filtering beds to improve this, but over a hundred years of mineral extraction has left problems.

pollution from mining

This small lake, is I believe, part of the clean-up scheme (and water storage too)

lake in the mountains US 550

The wider view below was taken with the Canon 15mm fisheye lens. Note its resistance to flare and the fact that by keeping the horizon through the centre of the (original) frame, there is little obvious distortion

mountain lke

On to Silverton, which had a distinctly empty feel when we first got there

silverton main street

In a nearby hillside, you can see evidence of mining

mine workings

Then the train from Durango arrives.

It's a narrow gauge steam railway that takes a few hours to wind its way up through the mountains from Durango. It then turns round, waits a while and goes back.

481 arrives at Silverton

A very scenic ride I'm told

no. 481

Today also happened to be the paricular day that children from Silverton Kindergarten welcome the arrival of the train (note minder/handler in dark shades to the right :-)

silverton welcome