I'm on my way

Clicking the pics will show a cloudy Fall day, but any day in the mountains is a good one.

It was a little foggy this morning leaving Denver and heading for the hills. But I was on my way, and I do like being on my way, fog or no fog.

I left Denver this morning at about 9:30, heading for the San Luis Valley in southern Colorado, and it was pretty cloudy and about 60°. As I moseyed on up into the mountains, it got mostly foggy and enough so that I had to slow down a little bit. But as I got higher, I came out of the low-lying clouds and into a nicer day, although it was still somewhat cloudy.

Once I got up above seven or eight thousand feet, the leaves started changing, and there was lots of yellow everywhere. And when I got to the top of Kenosha Pass, the leaves were almost perfect, and I would say that the leaves should be at their peak this coming weekend.

I think it's about 200 miles from Denver to the Sand Dunes National Park, and I'm boondocked at a State Wildlife area about 12 miles from the Park. It was an easy drive getting here, not much traffic. But from the look of these Fall leaves, I would say the mountains will be packed with leaf peepers this weekend, and the traffic will be a huge mess.

I don't know if there will be any Sandhill cranes here at the lake where I'm at, and I probably won't know until late this afternoon when the cranes fly over if there are any, and I can hear them making their weird croaking noise as they fly over my head to the lake.

There's been a drought around here for several years, and the lake is a mere shadow of its former self. But that's okay; the cranes don't care about deep water; they much prefer it kind of swampy, and there's a lot of that around here too.

It's been a busy day today with driving here and running around doing things, so my blog post is obviously later than normal.

                                                              Theboondork

 As I got higher into the mountains the weather got better but it was still cloudy and pretty chilly.

Once I got into the mountains the leaves started changing, and the higher I got the more they changed.

Going up Kenosha Pass most of the leaves had changed, or were well on their way.

At the top of Kenosha Pass the Aspens had all changed. But unfortunately it was a gray, gloomy day with low hanging clouds so the leaves didn't glow like they normally would.

Safely ensconced at my boondocking site, ready to go searching for the cunning, Lord of the skies, the Sandhill Crane. Respected by lesser birds, and feared by humans, all I need is one good picture to prove my mettle.