Random Photos from Road Trips

[Mark Sedenquist]

A couple more random photos.


(September 2019 with Peter Thody) This is the upper drainage of Grapevine Canyon, and a reasonably tough climb to even get here. For me, this is my "secret spot."


Greater Alberta, this is the Bleriot Ferry

[Rick Quinn]

Gotta to wonder why the Llama was standing in the lake!

Mark

Cooling his heels? Actually, I've always wondered that very thing, whenever I look at this photo. I just asked "Perplexity," the AI search engine, if such a sighting might be common, and the computer replied:

"Seeing a llama standing in shallow water near the shore of Lake Titicaca is relatively uncommon. While llamas are native to the region and often found grazing on the Altiplano, they typically prefer dry land rather than wading in water. The lake’s shallow areas may occasionally attract llamas, especially during hot weather, but such sightings are not a regular occurrence."

And there you have it.

Rick

[Rick Quinn]

Unsafe at any speed! Taken in the Connecticut woods, May of '79.

[glc]

Unsafe at any speed! Taken in the Connecticut woods, May of '79.

Be nice! I've owned 3 Corvairs in my life and I liked them.

[AZBuck]

Well at least the flags are both red, white and blue (or white, blue and red). Note the car is a
Ford rather than a Lada, the two different license plates (Texas and Russia) and the 'bumper' sticker in the rear window using the Cyrillic alphabet.



Shot in Moscow, 2006 while on a business trip.

AZBuck

Addendum: In posting this I realized for the first time that Russian license plates use the Roman alphabet rather than the Cyrillic. Probably to comply with some European Standard.

[Rick Quinn]

When I was a young dude, driving all over the Northern Andes in my Dodge Powerwagon, I discovered a very cool road outside the city of Manizales, in Colombia. The tallest mountain in the area was the Nevado del Ruiz, a stratovolcano that soared to 17,500 feet, high enough for a permanent crown of snow. They built a ski lodge at the snowline, mostly a bar serving brandy and hot toddies, plus maybe four small rooms for overnight guests. Nobody in their right mind would actually try to ski there, as the surface was much too icy and rocky. The road to the lodge took you to nearly 16,000 feet, and the kind of view that's usually reserved for mountain climbers. I drove up there twice, in 1973, and again in 1974, and always remembered it fondly as an extraordinary place.

My friends and I knew the mountain was a volcano, but it was dormant, so we didn't think much about it, and perhaps we should have! Ten years later, the Nevado blew its top, and the eruption caused a mudslide, a lahar, that roared down the mountain in the middle of the night and buried an entire town, killing 26,000 people as they slept.

My truck is just visible in the lower left corner, parked in a place that no longer exists!

[Mark Sedenquist]

US Navy Seals (in-training) running down the beach after an arduous 4 hours ocean trials in rough seas.

Del Coronado Hotel, March 2024
------------------------------------------------------------

Interstate 70 traversing the San Rafael Swell.

-------------------------------------------------------------

Megan Edwards (co-founder RTA) at Cedar Breaks NM

[Mark Sedenquist]

My truck is just visible in the lower left corner, parked in a place that no longer exists!

Wow! That's a dramatic photo and an equally dramatic explanation!

Mark

[Mark Sedenquist]

And I have posted similar ones in the past, but this is still pretty darn striking.

Lake Manly in Death Valley NP in February, 2024

This is just SE of Badwater.

Mark

[Rick Quinn]

Lake Manly in Death Valley NP in February, 2024




Mark

You were missing the llama, so I fixed it for you.

Rick