Dogs woke me up early this morning… so at o’dark:30 I thought I might as well take advantage of the early start and get some sunrise pictures. After a quick glance out the window and a check of the weather site on my phone, I decided otherwise. Freezing fog, light snow and 25 degrees were enough to send me back to the coffee pot. Even Big Dog wanted back inside to catch some more zzzz’s. So I just relaxed with some waffles and steaming black coffee with puppy dogs for a blanket. Three hours later I awoke again feeling considerably more rested, and it looked like the sun was going to shine a bit as well!
Dense fog still filled the Arkansas River Valley so the Sangre de Cristo were totally obscured, but as we cleared the ridge I could see some unusual objects on the hillside, must be deer or elk I thought. Closer inspection with my big Canon glass revealed a small herd of deer grazing on a beautiful hillside, bathed in the warm Colorado springtime morning sun. I snapped a couple from a distance assuming that the deer were going to run as soon as they noticed us, before stealthily meandering closer. As luck would have it the trail approached them at an angle… proceeding directly at wild animals is usually a recipe for photographic disaster. They looked up with a small amount of interest but fortunately they didn’t run.
Ever so quietly, I found a place to sit in the lovely sunshine and just shoot for a while while the deer were
occupied with their morning feeding. Finally they began to wander around the hillside in search of better grass I suppose, but by then I had accumulated 150 amazing images and was ready to finish hiking with the big dog anyway.
This afternoon the clouds cold and fog are back along with a few flurries now and then, perfect weather for processing pictures on the computer! I thought the day was going to be a bust but the Heavens were definitely shining upon me and for that brief period the Almighty split the skies and gave me a shot at a better day than usual 🙂
As always these images and more are available on my website as wall art and cool gift, tech and household items. Just click a gallery that you are interested in, click an image and wait for all the products and pricing to become available! You can also browse by product category if you already know what you are interested in!
