Self Portrait
I recently visited Washington for a week for training. Most of my time was spent indoors, so sadly there wasn’t a lot of time available for photography. I also ended up coming down with the flu/sinus infection from hell. Being sick away from home is possibly the worst thing you could do to me. I complained a good deal about that. I did manage to get outside briefly now and then and even managed to get a little sun while visiting Bainbridge Island. I was a little sad about not getting the photos I wanted, but I’m not too worried as I’ll be visiting again in June and then twice in August. Plenty of time right?!
I lived in Belfast, Northern Ireland for a few years after getting married and I couldn’t help but compare Washington to the Emerald Isle. Green is everywhere and stuff grows whether you want it to or not. I love visiting it. My eyes felt rested and my skin rejuvenated, but I was definitely happy to return to the sunny southwest. I’m definitely a sun worshipper and feel melancholy setting in after a few days of overcast and 4:30pm sunsets. After returning home I spent as much time outdoors as I could topping up my vitamin d intake.
So here are the few photos I’m willing to share from this trip. I’m happy to report that I’ve fully recovered from the pesky flu and am ready for my next trip to DC in just a few days!
Most of these photos were taken on the last leg of our trip, back to Arizona, but there is a smattering of other randomness because I forgot to post a few fabulous photos somewhere along the way. I’m warning you… there are a lot of photos! Haha! It’s been amazing sorting through them. Normally, the editing process can be a bit tiring for me, but with every photo I opened, I relived the moment I captured. That’s the sign of a photo well taken.
We headed south from Taos and took the Turquoise Trail. We were told that we just HAD to stop in this little artist community called Madrid (pronounced MAD-rid). Absolutely adorable with a shocking amount of galleries and shops for such a small town.
We took the 40 home for a very short while and then turned off onto a smaller highway and for the life of me I can’t remember what it was. It was about an hour longer according to my maps program on my phone, though because of the stunning beauty we kept stumbling upon, it probably added an extra 4 hours. I think it was maybe 4 hours of driving and during that time we passed maybe 10 vehicles. That’s my kind of road.
The sandstone cliffs were remarkable. It was one of those random moments where we just turned down an unknown road. I almost turned back because I felt guilty about driving the Miata on a dirt road (you didn’t just read that John). I promise it was a VERY well kept dirt road and I drove VERY slow. We had many moments like that on this stretch. We just happened upon great turnout after great turnout. The best part of any trip is when you wander down a road you didn’t even know existed before that moment you saw the turn for it. I’m not one to really do too much in the way of self portraiture but when you’re in the presence of the self portrait queen it kinda rubs off. This was my first official test using the remote triggers and I’m fairly pleased with the results! I hope to work on this more in the future. I did need rescued at one point as I managed to get myself out onto one of the cliffs and couldn’t manage to get myself back. Jillian gladly helped and it’s beyond me how she just hops over the deep crevices without even flinching. It’s enough to make my stomach turn.
While driving we realized we were following the same storm west that we had photographed in Taos (remember that amazing lightning?!). This made for dramatic landscapes, colors and shadows and not to mention the odd burst of rain. It was breathtaking. As we crossed the border into Arizona the sunset was one of the most beautiful I’ve seen. It’s almost as if Arizona was welcoming me home.
This is the last of my New Mexico posts. It’s quite the doozy right? I hope you enjoyed following our adventures. I’m already trying to figure out what our next adventure will be.
“A journey is a person itself; no two are alike. And all plans, safeguards, policing, and coercion are fruitless. We find after years of struggle that we do not take a trip; a trip takes us.” – John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley in Search of America
Here’s to being taken again soon.
Random smatterings from our trip that either didn’t seem to fit anywhere else or someone I forgot! Haha! Forgive me… there were a LOT of photos to edit!
The entrance to the Carlsbad Caverns
