Began the morning of day 2 just outside Cincinnati on a cloudy morning with the last remnants of cold front moving out. Decided to poke around downtown Cincinnati for an hour or so before heading westward along Interstate 74 to Champaign, Illinois. The trip would turn us north along Interstate 57 and east to Michigan later this day, and how far into Michigan we would make it depended upon how [...]
It was that time of the year again, for us to embark on another AARoads trip specifically to document roads. This year's trip focused on finishing what we started in November 2009, with a return trip to Indiana and Michigan for the purpose of driving the remaining Interstates that we did not cover two years prior. Day 1 took us northward from Alabama to Cincinnati, Ohio. The day started out [...]
A day spent in Northwest Territories … here’s just the first half, because I took 1560 photos that day, so I am breaking it in two. No northern lights in this batch; you can all go home now. Painted skies at dawn. A seagull at the Mackenzie River ferry. Yep, they do have them even thousands of miles from the nearest sea. Some yellow and some evergreens. […]
And here we start three days of photos from Alberta and Northwest Territories. I flew into Edmonton for the weekend (Friday-Sunday) of September 9th, as that is one of two annual peaks for the northern lights. Did I see the northern lights? In the interest of maintaining suspense, I’m not going to say quite yet. Sunset. Usually shooting directly into the sun is a bad idea. Sometimes it isn’t. The [...]
We resume this batch of pictures with a trip to Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado. Very close to the park entrance, we get this view. An elk calf! Young elk are surprisingly hard to spot, because their mothers tend to keep them very well hidden away. Certainly the first time I’ve ever seen one! A pair of bighorn sheep. That might be literally correct, as it is a ram [...]
We pick up in Iowa, where we decide to stop heading east in order to get to New Mexico. We see flooding along the Missouri River, and catch a thunderstorm in Kansas. Minimum maintenance road. Flooding causes standing water. Standing water causes mosquitoes and other insects. A fresh source of food means the dragonflies grow fat and happy. This one was about three inches long, with a five inch wingspan. [...]
The longest swath of the Fourth of July trip that we’ll feature in one set of photos: about 800 miles covered in this burst. Continuing on US-212 across eastern Montana, to get to South Dakota, and then driving through the Black Hills at the time of day when they are the blackest. We then continue into Nebraska, and drive US-20 east all the way to Iowa. Endless fields of yellow [...]
We continue on the Fourth of July trip … across Beartooth Pass we go, on US-212. One of the most scenic drives to be found anywhere. Squeezing in the last of morning light. This sign might very well date back to when US-12 in Wyoming was renumbered to US-212 in 1963! There are very few US-212 shields in Wyoming. About 9500 feet up the pass. This view is in infrared, [...]
The Fourth of July trip. Undertaken by Daniel Brim and me. Our usual arrangement holds – we take approximately identical photos, and try not to hit any raccoons and/or rabbits. Our destination is sunny Union County, New Mexico – by way of Beartooth Pass, Sioux City, and various other places that call into question our ability to drive in a straight line. We fly into Salt Lake City airport, and [...]
The third day of the Gila River trip, in which I return from New Mexico back home to San Diego. Campfire from the night before. I don’t remember why we decided that Frosty the Candle Snowman had to go, but we certainly sent him off to Valhalla in style. An old alignment of New Mexico state route 32 yields this tilted, decrepit junction assembly. It dates to the late 1960s [...]
