Colorado - Part 1

At the end of last month, we travelled to Colorado for my cousin's wedding. Since it was a family wedding, we brought along our entire crew of Cormacks. Which meant that Jonah (age 6) and Elliott (age 2) got to travel with us. If you've ever travelled with children you might know that it can occasionally be stressful. We flew on this trip, and luckily there was a direct flight from Little Rock to Denver. And amazingly, both kids ended up doing great on the flight. My wife read that a new trend is to bring a car seat with you on the plane, which makes the flight much easier since the little ones are constrained. And it worked! We landed in Denver successfully with few tears from the toddler or the other passengers sitting nearby.

We met up with my Aunt in Denver and spent the night at a hotel by the airport. And the next morning we left town and headed to the mountains (before having to stop and backtrack to the hotel to a retrieve a forgotten stuffed animal). The Rockies were beautiful, of course. Especially since the aspen trees were starting to show some great fall color. We were driving along the freeway but managed to find a few stops to try to get a pictures whenever we could. This was along a random exit that we took along I-70.



I'm sure we looked like a bunch of tourists, but were just amazed at how bright and vibrant the aspen leaves were.







The boys got out to stretch their legs, and to look at the aspens. I got this picture of Elliott in one of the few moments where he was still, and it might just be one of the better pictures I've ever gotten of him?



We got back onto the freeway but then pulled over at another exit to try to get a few more pictures....



And then back onto the freeway, only to take another exit just to take a few more pictures.





We left the freeway and headed deeper into the mountains. Along the way I pulled over at this scenic lake, which is apparently the Clinton Gulch Dam Reservoir. This would end up being the last stop for pictures that day since the little kids in the back of the car were getting restless.

Sunset From The Junction Bridge

So the other day I saw on Twitter that the International Space Station was going to fly over Little Rock in a few hours. So I tried to think of an ideal spot to see it, and headed out to try to get a few pictures. Based on the directions on the tweet, I decided to head out to the Junction Bridge. It seemed like the ISS would appear in the horizon above the downtown skyline and then travel across the sky.

I managed to get there early enough to catch a nice little sunset, and got a few pictures while I waited for the ISS to appear.



And then I waited, and waited. The time the ISS was scheduled to fly over passed, and I never saw it. Maybe it was still too bright in the sky to see it, or I was looking in the wrong direction. But alas, I missed it. But since I was there, I got a few more pictures of downtown Little Rock from the bridge...



And one more...

Two Rivers Park Sunset

One of the best place in Little Rock to catch the sunset is at the Two Rivers Park Bridge. So the other night I headed out there in the evening, and was lucky enough to catch this sunset:



It had been a rainy day, which must have kept a lot of people away from the bridge. I only saw two other people out there, which is rare since this is such a popular spot. And since there wasn't anyone else around, I didn't feel bad putting the tripod in the middle of the bridge to take a few pictures.

Broadway

There was a little article recently about an effort to raise money to add decorative lights to the new Broadway Bridge in downtown Little Rock. Currently, there are lights on the Clinton Park Bridge, the Junction Bridge and the Main Street Bridge. Maybe in the future the Broadway Bridge, the Baring Cross rail bridge and the new I-30 Bridge (whenever it is completed) will be illuminated. You would think that the state could add lights to the new I-30 bridge, since they are spending about a billion dollars on it (and also they could actually make it look nice, but that's another story). Anyways, here's a quick shot of the Broadway Bridge during the day, taken with the infrared camera:

Back To The Delta

I was able to make another little trip out to the Delta, in what turned out to be great conditions. It was rainy and cool outside, a rare treat in the summer in Arkansas. It is always nice to be able to take pictures and not end up sweating, or having the camera lens fog up every time you get out of the car because of the humidity.

The first stop was Scott, which has a plethora of old buildings that are just waiting to be photographed. This is the old train station, which was moved and is now part of a museum (the Scott Plantation Settlement).





Further down the road is Keo. The population of Keo is only 230 people, but it also has a great selection of neat old buildings.





Driving south from Keo there are these silos, surrounded by soybean fields.



And this old abandoned church, where most of the back roof has unfortunately collapsed.  





And then I headed down this little road, which dissected an oxbow lake that was filled with tupelo and cypress trees.







The waters of the lake were covered with a layer of green stuff, which is not algae but a small aquatic plant called duckweed.



From there I headed east once more, driving through the tiny community of Coy (population 96). There were a few neat old buildings here as well, including this old cotton gin. It looks like it's still being used for storage, despite it looking like it isn't in the best condition.



And just across the street (or dirt road, the be more accurate) was this view looking towards another old building. It was surrounded by a field of cotton. It's actually a little rare to see cotton growing around here now, since most of the fields have been turned over to soybeans and rice.





The main purpose of this drive out to the Delta was to try to find an old cotton gin in the small community of Hamilton. A few weeks ago, I drove out here to try to find it but had no luck - I didn't remember the exact location and drove around for a bit but never saw it. Turns out that I was just a mile or two short of where I needed to be. So although I had to wait for it, I made another trip to Hamilton. I finally got there, and got a few pictures. I'm happy to post them now, so I'm not throwing away my shot.





And just down the road I saw this, which I hoped might answer the age old question. But apparently the chicken crossed the road to get away from the weird photographer trying to take a picture.... 

There was a whole flock of chickens, and they seemed to be living inside this old building.



I hurried to get home after this, but made one last stop to get a shot of this road running through more flat fields in the Delta...