It must be summer

Living where I do, it seems as though summer often has a difficult time finding us. Until a couple of weeks ago, even though the calendar said June, it still didn't seem like the temperatures were warming up very much. But all of a sudden it was as though someone finally flipped the switch and summer has arrived.

Another sign of summer in the mountains is all of the events on the weekends...rodeos, mountain bike races, music festivals, running races, town festivals, and on and on. Having lived in Grand County for more than 20 years, I have had the chance to attend many of these events, but I had never been to Hot Sulphur Days or Kremmling Days...until this year. I had a great time covering these small-town celebrations.





The Grand County Blues Society hosted its sixth Blues from the Top festival at the end of June in Winter Park at the revamped Hideaway Park. I've always felt like I have eclectic taste in music, but my experience with the blues has been limited--mostly the few blues shows the GCBS has put on during the past year. Having the opportunity to hear a variety of artists over the course of the two days of this year's BFTT was a memorable experience. I will say that if you ever have the chance to see Zac Harmon in person, make sure you do, otherwise you will miss an incredible performer. Zac had, what has to be, the unenviable task of opening Sunday's show at 11:00 a.m. All he did was blow everyone away with a performance full of energy and a pure love for what he was doing--it was better than a tall, double latte!



Here is blues harmonica player Jason Ricci silhouetted against a tent near the stage:



And because it's taking me so long to post this, I might as well include the Fourth of July. I traveled from one end of the county to the other covering the various events celebrating the holiday. I had three choices of fireworks displays to attend and I finally chose to go to Kremmling to see their "Fire Up the Cliffs" display, which I had never seen before. I spent quite of bit of time choosing a location to shoot from. I settled on shooting from a spot along U.S. Highway 40 just west of town where I could get a reflection of the cliffs and fireworks in a pond. I almost regretted my decision when I was immediately attacked by a swarm of mosquitoes, but luckily had a stash of repellent in the car. In the end it was all worth it. Here is the result:



I was able to shoot a second display the following night when Granby did their display following the final Flying Heels Rodeo of the season. Because the fireworks were set off immediately after the conclusion of the rodeo (around 9:30), I didn't have time to get set up and follow my normal timetable for shooting fireworks where I normally would make my first image about an hour prior to the start of the show, so that I have a frame with detail in the sky. But I was still happy with the result:



(Both fireworks photos were created from four different files and combined into one final image.)

Does this mean I'm getting old?

It was a special time last weekend as my daughter Emily graduated from high school. She was also one of the valedictorians, which made it all the more special. I am very proud of her!





On a closing note, I was shooting some end of school year festivities at a local elementary school yesterday and came across these flags that were being passed out to the parents. I thought it was quite funny/ironic/sad. If it doesn't show up well and you can't read it, it says "Made in China."