Favorite Landscapes of 2015

Off Forest Road 76

Note I said Favorite and not best in the title of this blog reviewing my photographs of 2015. I said favorite because these were all taken at favorite spots in my neighborhood. Places I have gone often and stopped to take yet another picture of. It was not the only picture I took of a mountain or road or group of trees and I doubt it will be my last of these scenes. In the year past I think they were also featured more than once in a different light or a different season. These are just my favorite.

Dancing Cat Mountain

It has another name, but the folk of Black Lake call it Dancing Cat because of the shape of the avalanche valley when filled with snow. I think of it as more my mountain than Wheeler or Old Mike because it overlooks Black Lake. This was a perfect day for this photograph. The snow, the light, the clouds, and the shadows combined for a great snap.

Wheeler and friends from Black Lake

As I have mentioned in photographic blogs before the aim in getting a photograph of the highest mountain in New Mexico is to do it without roads and signs and fences. And this photograph has all of those things. And yet, of all the photographs of the Sangre de Cristos this year this is my favorite. I think the road and the sign and the fence give a sense of distance and perspective not evident in photographs of just the mountain range. The clouds helped too.

La Veta in Colorado

 I have mentioned I live close to the Colorado border. I think this range of mountains is about 26 miles from where I stood on US 64 near Cold Beer Bar. I had gone to the Maxwell Wildlife Refuge 20 mines further south and had to pull over on a rise before Hwy 64 so I could attempt to capture the spring snow on the far mountains. And the clouds. New Mexico, and Colorado are know for their blue skies but it is so often the clouds which make the landscape.

At the foot of Wheeler

On this particular day I had pulled off to the shoulder every minute or so in attempt to capture a peak at the mountain behind this foothill. Ultimately it because about this foothill and the shadows cast upon it as the clouds rose. And the light on the aspen grove on the top.