Tag Archives: Northern Colorado

Didn’t Work Out

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Lots of dreams came into the high country. Some were realistic while others were utter follies. This one had promise. If things didn’t work out it wasn’t because of lack of effort. Lots and lots of labor, not to mention expense, went into making this a paying proposition and maybe it was for a while. The workmanship was excellent, there was water nearby and the location was chosen with the idea that their whole livelihood and maybe even their life here, depended on it. But the high country can be a terrible mistress.

Many things could have happened to cause this going concern to slowly fade away. There were years when tanned bearded men with hand swung scythes slowly moved through the tall grass meadows, the rhythms and constancy of their labor producing wide swatches of new cut hay. Then there were years when those same men stood looking out into parched fields where the grass barely came up to their ankles, wondering if they would have to sell the herd because they couldn’t feed them that winter. Drought cares little for dreams.

Some times small pox or some other undetermined but deadly cough came roaring thru the valleys in a black terrible wave, robbing the families of their future. The families were big, they needed lots of kids to grow up strong and help work the land and when they were taken too soon so was hope. But that was life. These people were hardy, they were strong and they did not give up easily. Always the land called for its due and they provided it, or they didn’t make it. Up here failure was not caused by lack of fortitude, but sometimes fortitude wasn’t enough and hard decisions had to be made. There was no shame when the country defeated you only sorrow that perhaps that extra spark of luck wasn’t there when you needed it most.

As we pass by today and see this testament to the strength, grit and determination of these early settlers we only see the outside of their story. The slowly crumbling buildings, the fences down, the hay uncut. It is easy to dismiss this small set of buildings as just another scenic element, but people lived and loved and worked here. They gave it their lives and we can only imagine what their stories truly were. For some of them it didn’t work out, but their efforts and their lives were not wasted. This land is filled with stories of those that did make it and prospered and helped us become what we are today. Their unrecorded memories are treasures to be discovered and cherished and perhaps the next time we pass one of these forgotten dreams we can stop for a moment and celebrate their lives. Maybe they will some how know and get some comfort that they’re not forgotten.

Dark Days

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Summer is the time when we seem to have the most radical changes in our weather, especially as it concerns light. It can start out bright sun and clear skies and suddenly a storm will roll off the mountains and create huge towering clouds and everything goes dark. Then within moments the storm moves on and it’s sunny again. The trick is to be somewhere cool when all that changing is happening.

Fortunately that isn’t difficult around here. This place is so cool that just going to the dumpsters to dump the trash is neat. The place pictured above isn’t near the dumpsters however, I had to travel nearly five whole miles to be in the right spot for this shot. Yeah I know, epic journeys like that are the stuff of legend but when it’s an everyday occurrence you sort of just take it in stride. Coloradoans are an adventurous lot and when you’re a photographer to boot, well, there’s nothing we won’t do to get the shot. Even if means standing next to a busy highway with dangerous semi-trucks whizzing by blowing their horns because they think you’re parked too close to the roadway and you went and forgot your dumb sunglasses and there might be rattlesnakes somewhere nearby  and so on and so on. The risks are mind-boggling but we don’t care we’re bred for it. I must admit I’ve done even more riskier stuff to get the shot but those are stories for another time. And I can make up only so much of this stuff at one time, I mean with so many adventures under my belt it becomes difficult to remember them all.

With all the varied types of scenery we have it almost becomes a chore to decide where to shoot. This view is looking east, if you turn and look west you will see the foothills and towering mountains. To the south and slightly east the plains roll on forever and you can see straight ahead for two days. And that’s just the overview, as you look closer there are countless details that would take several lifetimes to photograph. Then add the seasons in the mix and you don’t know if you’ve been snakebit or struck by lightning because when it comes to making choices, you’re paralyzed. Now before I make this sound like it’s an impossible task I must confess that it’s not as difficult as I may make it sound, Jeez if you stumble and press the shutter right before your face smacks the pavement you’re going to get a great shot. It’s much more difficult to stay cool and suave looking while you’re working than it is to make magnificent photos. I mean you don’t want to look like some dweeb when you’re out here

So remember to look in your backyard when you want to take pictures, you might have a view out there just like this one that you haven’t noticed before. If you do grab your camera and get out there while the storms still here. There’s pictures to get took.

Little Gate on the Prairie

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Much of the time spent photographing the high plains area in Northern Colorado is spent on shooting the ‘Big’ stuff, things like the mountain ranges from a plains viewpoint or huge sweeping vistas of rolling hills and grasslands, but like any other place you’ve been to, the details are what give it it’s personality. That personality is more often than not created by the folks that live here and a lot of that personality is highlighted by the ingenuity and common sense details that they have established. This little gate for instance is located quite some distance from any habitation and appears to have been put there so one can cross the fence without ripping the bottom out of their jeans. Straddling the fence, holding the top wire down, keeping the barbs out of your hands, trying to maintain some dignity while you teeter back and forth if your legs are too short or worse, you get the barb stuck in the seam of your pants and you can’t let the wire go because it took too much pressure to hold it down so you could swing your leg over, and now you’re stuck, all of these things are eliminated by this simple little gate. So is crawling under the bottom wire, our rattlesnakes prefer that you use the gate also. The by-product of this useful bit of convenience is a very cool bit of western charm. There must have been ladies living near here, and as they have the same type of difficulty crossing fences that fellows do, but not liking to look undignified even more than the menfolk, they may be a bit quicker on suggesting solutions to some of the smaller inconveniences we deal with out here. However it came to be here there is no denying the extra character it imparts to an already character saturated western scene.