Why my car hates me...

When I go to all these national parks (about 47 by now), I have a tendency to go to their most remote places--which often bave bad roads. Some are more scary than others, and a few are classics.

On my recent Colorado trip, I went up over the Ophir Pass, South of Ouray. The road is a single-track gravel monster. When you have the misfortune to meet a car coming the other way (I had two when I was climbing the lower section), it is definitely a hair-whitening moment. Both drivers have to fold in their rear-view mirrors, and the guy on the dropoff side prays a lot.

On the way back down I was fortunate--nobody was coming up, so I shot some video:

That was just the upper section. The lower road is longer and narrower. The road runs above the tree line, that's why you see the trees down below in the valley below 10,000 feet.

If you were my car and I drove you on roads like this, wouldn't you hate me?

A short sequence on Maroon Bells...

This is a brief video to illustrate the wonderful sunrise as it develops over Maroon Bells, which lies ten miles West of Aspen, Colorado. It really is a magical place, and a video can illustrate what a single image can't. It is the process of each sunrise which makes it so special.

Day 14-The weather held off just long enough....

As I drove around the park today trying to get those final shots, the radio broadcast repeated warnings of a Red Flag Alert for high winds. Those winds started kicking up just as I drove back to the motel. Whew! I can imagine what happens when the red dust is blowing in everywhere.

Still, today the sun was strong, bringing out the colors in the sandstone. The center formation here is the 'Kissing Couple,' one of many spectaculor vertical monuments:

Here are two views of Balanced Rock, proving that Mother Nature really has a sense of humor. Don't you get the feeling that you've seen that face before?

Alas, all good things finally come to an end. I'm running out of clean clothes, anyway.

Good-bye, via Red Canyon, one of the last big scenes we encounter leaving the park.

Day 13-Winding down at Colorado National Monument...

The weather has held up perfectly since Rocky Mountain National Park. Think I should get out of here before i press my luck too far.

Colorado National Monument is another erosion masterpiece, I high plateau whose perimeter has been eroded into long, deep valleys separated by immense sandstone arms. This is but a portion of Ute Valley:

One of the most spectacular features is Monument Valley:

I admired the crazy folks who climbed Independence Monument! That's it, in the distance above the sign.

Of course, they probably think I'm crazy for having spent all those years diving with sharks...

I'll take the sharks, any day! As I said many times, i can swim up out of an emergency, but if one falls from these places, there is only one outcome...

I'm almost at the end of this odyssey. Colorado will soon throw me out, so ! had better start thinking about getting home before it occurs to them. So far, I've busted a lens and my big tripod. Trying to shoot HDR pictures (which require a steady camera) is getting difficult.

 Still, there are more vertical cliffs to curl my toes over...

Day 12-Leaving the High Rockies...

I drove South to the area around Telluride, in the heart of ski country. I could hear the prayers for snow rising all around, but I ignored them and raced for the peaks.

The Ophir Pass is high (12,000 feet and more), and the road up to it is single-lane, winding and hair-raising. I met a few other cars, and getting around them on the narrow track with a sheer dropoff on one side was nightmarish.

The lower sections of the long road had a variety of spectacular scenes:

Did I mention that it's Fall? The lower elevations were ablaze with aspencolor!

Looming behind the colorful hills are the brooding mountaintops.

This time of year is beautiful here, and I'm trying to capture as much of it as I can!

I'll end with serene Alta Lake, which lies at the end of another rough, winding and boulder-strewn road.

Tomorrow it's off to Grand Junction for the final chapter of this adventure. Colorado National Monument and Grand Mesa, and then--HOME!!

Day 11-A rich irony...

Hundreds of people visit the south Rim of the Black Canyon of the Gunnison each day because it is easily accessed fom a main road. The North Rim, far more spectacularly vertical, gets mere dozens.

Did I say vertical?

The scenes are vast:

And if you love those narrow ledges with sheer drops on either side, this is your place. I'm standing on a three-foot wide ridge wgich projects out above the Kneeling Camel formation.:

Here's that fabulous 'Kneeling Camel' from the other side. My little ridge is the higher one to the upper left. Not a place you would want to spend a lot of time, actually.:

The cutely-named Exclamation Point takes a three-mile hike, but is worth every step!

The Fall foliage is in full riot everywhere, so I'm heading south to catch some of it!