Tag: nature

Colorado High Country in the Late Afternoon

After leaving the Rio Grande River, the drive along Colorado 149 took me over Spring Creek Pass. At summit of the pass, I crossed the Continental Divide. Rivers on one side of the divide, like the Rio Grande, flow to the east, while rivers like the Colorado that originate on the other side of the divide head towards the Pacific Ocean.

This late afternoon image was taken along the side of the road as I descended from Spring Creek Pass. At this point, the road began to climb again and eventually took me through Slumgullion Pass, which at 11,360 ft (3463 m), was the highest point on my trip.

The Rio Grande River, Colorado

One of my goals on my recent trip to the United States was to see parts of the country I had never seen before. To that end, a drive along State Highway 149 brought me through a part of Colorado I was visiting for the first time. I began the 117 mile trip where SH 149 turns north off of US 160 at South Fork in south central Colorado. The first part of the journey took me through the Rio Grande National Forest alongside the upper reaches of the Rio Grande River, which has its headwaters in Colorao’s San Juan Mountains. With a length of 1760 miles, the Rio Grande is the fourth longest river in the United States, following the Missouri, the Mississippi and the Yukon (which flows through both Canada and Alaska in the US).

This image of the Rio Grande was taken some 30 to 40 miles from where the river originates in the San Juans. I arrived at this spot on a crystal clear, late summer day at around 3:30 in the afternoon. With the sun moving towards the horizon, the light was just beginning to get soft. There really is nothing quite like Colorado’s high country on a day like this.

Bear Rescue Center, Laos

At the entrance to the Kuang Si Falls park area, there is a small wildlife preserve run by an organization called Save the Bears. The refuge is for Asian Black Bears. Poachers hunt these animals for their bile, which is an ingredient in traditional Chinese medicine recipes. The bears are also threatened by deforestation, one of those environmentally unfriendly, unsustainable by-products of economic development.

The bears are playing. As best as I could tell, the bear on the left was laughing in the face of the one on the right. I was standing in a building somewhat above my subjects; the fence separating me from the bears is not visible in the picture.

Turquoise, Kuang Si Falls, Laos

The water that cascades over the Kuang Si Falls is a startling shade of turquoise blue. An informational sign explains that the water picks up limestone particles with high levels of calcium carbonate as it falls over the rocks and this is what gives it the unique color. This was not an easy photo to work with. It took quite a bit of work in Photoshop to come up with a color that is a reasonable match to what I saw in nature.

Kuang Si Waterfall, Laos

The Kuang Si Waterfall area is about a one hour drive south of Luang Prabang. Over a road with numerous axle-breaker potholes. I rode in the back of what is called a tuk tuk in Laos, a pickup truck with a cover over the back and wooden benches along both sides of the bed. It was a bumpy ride.

The falls themselves are beautiful, and I visited at the tail end of the dry season in this part of the world. Significantly more water comes pouring over the falls after the summer rainy season begins in June. The good news is that the hot, dry month of May is the low season for tourism in and around Luang Prabang. There were plenty of other people visiting the falls, but finally it was not that crowded.