Posts Tagged ‘Badlands’
Closing an eventful day
Late in the afternoon on October 18th we stopped at Camel Rock on US 84 north of Santa Fe. While no colorful sunset came to meet us there the way it had in 2017, for a brief time the sun did pierce the western clouds to spotlight parts of the badlands prominent on the eastern side of the highway. That dedicated light advantaged me, as did focal lengths at the long end of my 100–400mm lens, when I hurried to portray the illumined badlands formations before the clouds settled back in.
In the top picture, the snow-covered Sangre de Cristo Mountains provided the background. That’s where this one remarkable photographic day began. It included yellow aspens and cottonwoods and willows, forests, badlands, hoodoos, and of course snow-covered mountains. It has provided the material for 10 posts with at least two photographs apiece. I could easily have done more posts about that day but the time has come to move on, even as the next day saw us moving on.
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Yesterday on a local television program the announcer spoke about “a California nursing home facility.” That last word is redundant because a nursing home is a kind of facility. Nothing is lost in saying “a California nursing home.” Similarly unnecessary is the last word in often-heard phrases like “in a school setting” and “in a hospital setting.” It’s sufficient to say “in a school” or “in schools,” “in a hospital” or “in hospitals.”
© 2022 Steven Schwartzman
Chimayó: a sactuary for fall foliage
The little town of Chimayó, about 25 miles north of Santa Fe, is famous for its Catholic shrine, El Santuario de Chimayó [The Santuary of Chimayó]. Now a National Historic Landmark, it receives some 300,000 visitors per year, and we two were among them on October 18th. We did enter the small church but spent almost all our time outside, where the trees on the property were putting on a great display of fall foliage. The tallest tree in the top picture is a cottonwood (Populus deltoides subsp. wislizenii), and the ones below it seem to be willows (Salix sp.). A stream, apparently called the Potrero [pasture, paddock] Ditch, which forms a border of the property, may account for the trees’ vigor. You see the yellow-bordered stream in the second photograph.
Even the nearby hills added a bit of pastel warmth to the autumn show:
© 2022 Steven Schwartzman
From Nambé to Chimayó
On October 18th at Nambé Pueblo I had a great time photographing the hoodoos and other formations. Then, as we continued north-northeast on Highway 503, which forms a portion of the High Road to Taos Scenic Byway, to reach Chimayó about 10 miles away, we kept seeing more parts of the Nambé badlands that deserved to pictured.
You’re seeing two of those pictures here. And who could resist the clouds
over the snow-covered Sangre de Cristo mountains off to the east?
© 2022 Steven Schwartzman
More from Nambé Pueblo
On October 18th at Nambé Pueblo I had a great time photographing the badlands. Today’s first two pictures provide closer looks at hoodoos on opposite sides of the panorama that set the scene two posts back. The patch of yellow at the edge of the second picture was a cottonwood tree, Populus deltoides subsp. wislizenii.
And here’s a clear shot of the hoodoo that previously appeared behind trees:
© 2022 Steven Schwartzman
Nambé Pueblo
On October 18th we happily turned in toward Nambé Pueblo and its intriguing geological formations. As much as I would have liked to get close to them, they were on fenced-off tribal land, so I got as near as I could from the closest roads and zoomed in with my 100–400mm lens.
In the top picture, two cottonwood trees, Populus deltoides subsp. wislizenii, had turned yellow. (Click to enlarge the panorama.) I eventually managed clear shots of the hoodoo in the last picture but I still like the view of it hiding behind trees.
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A November 13th commentary discussed the way people add an unnecessary qualifier to a word. Here’s another example. News is called news because it’s new. In spite of that, news announcers on television now almost always call it breaking news. News flash: if it weren’t breaking it wouldn’t be news, so drop the breaking and just call it news.
© 2022 Steven Schwartzman
Alberta’s badlands
Three years ago today we visited the badlands east of Drumheller, Alberta.
We stopped there once near the beginning of our trip, and now again near the end.
If you’re looking for a great place to visit, this it it.
© 2020 Steven Schwartzman
Dinosaur Provincial Park revisited
On this date three years ago we visited Dinosaur Provincial Park in the southern part of the Canadian province of Alberta. (Oh, if only we could travel again now!)
In today’s post you’re seeing some more views of that scenic place.
Below, how about what looks like a petrified whirlpool?
And speaking of the country that stretches across the top of the United States, here are two quotations by Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield:
“You don’t sit around and not know stuff.” “To me, science is just formalized curiosity.”
© 2020 Steven Schwartzman
More from South Dakota’s Badlands National Park
On May 31, 2017, I took over 600 photographs at South Dakota’s Badlands National Park. I showed several of them that year and others on the one-year anniversary. Now here are six more pictures of that scenic place.
© 2019 Steven Schwartzman
Not humdrum
A year ago today we headed northeast from Calgary, driving almost two hours across the great Alberta prairie.
That was our third and last visit to the area around Drumheller.
We reconfirmed that the Canadian badlands near Drumheller are anything but humdrum.
©2018 Steven Schwartzman
Dinosaur Provincial Park
A year ago today we visited Dinosaur Provincial Park in Alberta.
Past posts about the place have shown strange cloud shadows in the sky and a panorama that includes a hoodoo with a head-like shadow.
Now you’re seeing some more views of that ruggedly scenic place.
© 2018 Steven Schwartzman
Portraits of Wildflowers 