Day 492

Devotchka

...(this song was stuck in my head the whole trip...no matter what I was doing)

(kind of a long post...get ready...)

...

5/21/2008

taken : 5/21/2008


...
Sand Dunes Trip

...
Wednesday marked the overnight field trip with my Environmental Digital Photo class to THE SAND DUNES. Woo.
Scott and Gordon came too.

The last time I was at the sand dunes was somewhere around 7th grade. I remember thinking the trip was incredibly stupid...and just not into it....but I was amazed during this trip.
...

Early in the morning I dropped off Lace with Bonesaw and LC. I rushed back to my place and packed up the car, fueled up, and went to an ATM.

It was a bad sign that Scott hurt himself and was bleeding in the car before we even left Boulder...hell, before we even met up with the rest of the class.

Scott was pretty positive he was going to die somewhere along the trip.

...

After a pointless meet up with the rest of the class (actually only 4 other students from class) Scott, Gordon, and myself headed out.

...

Our first stop (to change drivers mostly) was where the above panorama was taken. This was taken from a scenic overlook on US 285 looking down at Buena Vista. It was quite pretty.

...

The other group requested that we stop somewhere and meet them...but we really didn't feel like, so we just trucked on towards the sand dunes.

Along the way we passed a UFO landing and Observation deck that was in the middle of no where...we didn't stop...but the other group did.

There were also signs for The Colorado Reptile something or other...crocodiles mostly I think...

...we didn't stop there either...

...

After hours of driving we finally made it. We threw up our camp site, drank some beers and ate some food and headed to the visitors center.

We were all curious how these huge fucking sand dunes ended up here...

...and well...it's just a coincidence really...



We went back to camp and met up with the other groups. After some eating and drinking the groups split up and headed for the dunes.

...



...

The weather was not ideal. The light was shit.

...but it made for some nice clouds for a dramatic sky.

I was truly amazed at how enormous the sand dunes were. I didn't remember them being so damn big. They just go on and on and on.

...

We had no idea where the other group went, and we just set off by ourselves...

...


We were pretty eager to hike those motherfucking sand dunes...but after the first dune...we got a little tuckered out. We took frequent breaks. We picked a couple of lines to follow to try to get to what we thought was the highest dune in the park.


...

Scott decided to get to the top of each dune as fast as he could so he could rest for a little bit.

...



...and then he's over it.


...



We sat there for quite a while taking a breather.

We were still determined to make it to the top of the highest dune we could see....but the weather started to get worse, and the wind was blowing really really really hard...and when the sand comes rolling up off of those dunes in the wind...it stings.



(okay...I'll quit with pictures of the sand)

...



So we booked it the fuck out of there (which took a while because the wind was getting really nasty) and headed back to our campsite.

...

There we drank beers (and some Crown Royal) with the other group and sat around a campfire (typical).

It cleared up a little so Gordon, myself and Scott took a short hike to take some long exposure frames...


This is the result of my attempt....






(ISO 200. f/5.6. 17mm. 1094 seconds.)



not too shabby...


............


pulling up to the entrance to the Sand Dunes National Park

Gordon : "Want to get out and take a picture of the sign?"

Scott : "...Fuck you."


...

End of extremely long post/new digital version of watching relatives slide presentation of their trip somewhere...