A few more about Colorado's railroad heritage...
Colorado Railroad Museum, part 1
The tip came already some time ago from my German photography friend Maren Arndt. Don’t miss the Railroad Museum in Golden, if you are in this part of Colorado! Well, we finally used the last day of our journey through the southern and central part of Colorado for a visit. The kids were already back in school and so there were not very many visitors beside us. Good for photography in such a place! ;-)
I grew up in Germany traveling by trains that were pulled by steam locomotives. The smell of smoke and coal and the noise of the steam engine are deep in my memories. As a kid I often stood together with my grandpa Willy Stock on a bridge, west of the train station in my home town Bautzen, and we watched the busy traffic in the train yard. I don’t know if this had somehow influenced my decision to become a mechanic, and later a design engineer, but the technical and logistic side of railroads have always fascinated me. Going to the Colorado Railroad Museum stirred up all these good memories and I felt a little like a kid in a candy store…
I could bubble here about the technical aspects to make photos in a museum, but who cares? The bottom line for my style of photography is to keep the elements out of the frame that cry “museum”. I just want my images to tell the story about railroad heritage.
A last word about the people that work or volunteer in the railroad museum. We hear these days a lot about passion, passion in life, passion about photography, you name it. Everybody we had a conversation with in the museum, from the people at the reception desk and in the museum store to the engineers that kept some of the locomotives running, they all had a spark in their eyes, the spark of passion for railroad heritage… Love it!
Colorado landscapes: Silverton - train depot
The next stop on our recent Colorado trip was the area of Silverton. We stayed at a wonderful campsite, just a few minutes away from town and surrounded by high mountains. With 2,836m (9,305 ft) Silverton is one of the highest towns in the United States. It is a former mining camp but has no longer active mining. We had our car but you can reach the town also from Durango, Colorado by a train of the Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad, a National Historic Landmark.
You can’t resist the charm of this old mining town, especially around the train depot, where we went the first evening after our arrival…
Colorado landscapes: Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad
If you are a railroad buff and like especially steam locomotives and historic railroads, Colorado is definitely the place to go for.
The Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad (C&TS) is a 3 ft (914 mm) narrow gauge heritage railroad running between Chama, New Mexico and Antonito, Colorado. It runs over 10,015 ft (3,053 m) Cumbres Pass and through Toltec Gorge, from which it takes its name. Trains operate from both endpoints and meet at the midpoint. Today, the railroad is now the highest narrow gauge steam railroad in the United States. (source: Wikipedia)
During the trip from the Great Sand Dunes to our next destination we followed partly this railroad between Antonito, CO and Charma in New Mexico. Right at the moment when we reached Cumbres Pass the train left the station and gave us just a few seconds to make a couple clicks.
Red Rock Country, part 3
A wonderful place to be is the Slide Rock State Park, located in the Oak Creek Valley between Flagstaff and Sedona, Arizona. I stopped there yesterday morning. The colors of the surrounding canyon walls were still not washed out, like later during the day, and I tried to capture the essence of this lovely landscape.
The house at the entrance of the state park caught my attention. I love how the white trim and the stairs speak a clear graphic language and emphasize the design of the house in its natural setting.
- 3413 + 2164
Today, on my way back to Phoenix, I stopped at several interesting locations. One of them was the train depot in Clarkdale, Arizona. Unfortunately the passenger train had already left for a tour with visitors, but those two diesel locomotives were parked at the depot. The puffy clouds made for a nice background and nobody was there to bother me while I took the pictures between the railroad tracks. More to come...
Old No. 6
Three weeks ago I made my first steps with NIK's Silver Efex Pro (click the tag "NIK software" below to see my earlier posts). Yesterday I downloaded the new version Silver Efex Pro 2, and of course, started working with it immediately. More presets, more sliders, more ways to give your image the look you have in mind. A powerhouse for B&W photography!
15 mm, 1/80 sec. @ f5, ISO 200, -2/3 EV,
This picture of "Old Number 6" was taken during our last year's vacation tour through the Cascade Mountain range in Washington. This steam locomotive is located in Newhalem along the North Cascade Highway. "No. 6" carried supplies and equipment to built the dams and powerhouses for the Skagit River Hydro-electric project, which supplies the City of Seattle with low cost electricity. The steam engine was used until 1954 and has been restored to operating conditions in the 1970's by the "Skagit River Railway Volunteers".
I used a sepia tone for this picture because I believe this style harmonizes with the subject and reflects the age of that wonderful looking "No. 6" very well.