If you are camped in the midst of the San Juan Mountains in the fall you will find lots, seriously lots and lots, of great photo opportunities. Fall color generally starts in mid-September and lasts through early October. We are parked at the northern end of the San Juan Skyway Loop. While the loop is great, some of the best opportunities are on side roads. County Road #5 is one of those county side roads. Know before you start off that these are dirt roads, some good and some not so good. You will not be alone on these narrow dirt county roads. This time of year photographers line the small pull-outs, politely pass slowly to keep the dust down and share stories if you ask. The most common questions are: where is it good to find fall color, how is the road, and has the color peaked. Once those questions are discussed we get down to the niceties such as where they are from, what are they doing at this spot and finally we get to the nitty gritty such as gear.
This is the Sneffel Range.
This is a typical dirt curve on County Road #5. As we drove along the road became more and more challenging. Eventually one enters into the Uncompahgre National Forest and climbs up toward the Sneffels. We eventually turned around, unable to navigate deep ruts and mud.
There are quite a few ranches along the road.
Those are cows in that meadow. County Road #5 provides lots of opportunities for panoramic photographs.
Yes, I was pinching myself to make sure this was real.
I love a Golden Hour opportunity. Notice the gold on the mountains.
Still a pretty good road at this point.
We might have been tempted to stay for a sunset but there were no clouds and my new favorite resource, Skyfire, an in app subscription within The Photographer's Ephemeris, suggested there would be no color around sunset. Skyfire predicts the potential for sunset associated color. I have been checking daily and evaluating its predictive value. I call daughters in Phoenix and my brothers in several locations and ask them how the sunset played out. Of course I can use my own location as well. So far I can share that it is pretty darn good!! If you are using TPE you might want to check it out. On this particular night it was correct.