Tuesday, February 11, 2014

Roxborough State Park, February 2014: Fountain Valley Trail, Part II

Click here for Part I.

The weather was gorgeous, the hour was still early, I had nowhere to be and two cameras in my hands.  Why wouldn't I take the full loop of the Fountain Valley Trail rather than turn back early?

Roxborough State Park: Fountain Valley Trail
Empty benches may be my new thing ...

Roxborough State Park: Fountain Valley Trail
Vigilant as I was, I neither saw nor heard a single rattlesnake.

Roxborough State Park: Fountain Valley Trail
I like using foreground objects to frame background ones, but may have gotten a wee bit carried away with this fence around the Horace Persse Homestead.

Roxborough State Park: Fountain Valley Trail
I loved how the return portion of the loop trail went right smack between two tall formations.  I can't believe I'd never walked it before, having lived a whole 20 minutes away for nearly 10 years now.

Roxborough State Park: Fountain Valley Trail
The photo doesn't do it justice, but the sun reflecting off the snow on the rock faces was pretty striking.  Maybe I shouldn't have backed off a bit with my polarizing filter.

Roxborough State Park: Fountain Valley Trail
Tall rock silhouettes are becoming a bit of a thing for me, too.

Roxborough State Park: Fountain Valley Trail
Despite the great weather I only ran into a handful of other folks on the trail.  I think I heard once that Roxborough is the least-visited state park in Colorado.  I suppose one of them has to be, but it still seems like a shame.

Roxborough State Park: Fountain Valley Trail
I was slightly rewarded by having my zoom lens ready to go on my trusty D90 by this shot of a chickadee.  Those little buggers didn't sit still for long, though.

Roxborough State Park: Fountain Valley Trail
I'm not sure how much longer these icicles were going to last.  But I was glad they lasted long enough for me to see and shoot them.

Really great morning.  I puttered around for about  2 1/2 hours on the trails, which were coincidentally about 2 1/2 miles long.  I definitely want to come back and walk the Fountain Valley Trail again in the spring to see how different it is when all the white is replaced with green!

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