[Leica] Trip Report: Telluride, Colorado USA

[phwl@cse.cuhk.edu.hk]

I recently went to a 3 week Engineering workshop in Telluride Colorado
and here is a trip report (photos can be viewed on my www site - see
below). 

I am currently living in Hong Kong and a few days prior to the trip, I
purchased a 15mm Heliar from Dr Yao who took the trouble of delivering
the lens to Cameron photo in Kowloon to save me a trip out to Hong Kong
Island - thanks! We are very fortunate to have him in HK since he is a
great guy, knowledgable about all things Leica and offers great service
and prices.

I took my light weight travel kit with me (it is also my *entire* Leica
kit): M6, 35mm Summicron ASPH and the 15m Heliar, along with my trusty
Olympus MJU as a backup camera.  All of this along with my compact
binoculars fits neatly in an Eagle Creek "Protect-It" excursion bag.

This was my first trip to Colorado, although as a flyfisherman, I've read
a lot about it, particularly in John Gierach's books. Telluride is a
breathtakingly beautiful place and I would recommend it to anyone as
a holiday destination. I imagine it can be even more beautiful when it
snows there.

I used mostly Superia 200 but also took a single roll of Velvia which I
had in the fridge. The roll of Velvia was a mistake - they all came out
at least a stop underexposed and had a very blue color cast. I've shot
lots of Velvia and it hasn't happened to me before. I don't think I had
the meter set wrong, both 35mm and 15mm shots were underexposed so it
wasn't anything to do with the Heliar, the rolls before and after were
ok so it wasn't the camera, perhaps it was an old roll of film? I
didn't check the expiry but even if it had expired, it couldn't have
been by more than a few months and it has been in my fridge all the
time. Anybody had this experience before? I haven't tried yet but it
may be possible to get a digital print from that roll, but I don't
think that I could get a conventional print out of it.

I was very pleased with the Heliar and certainly recommend it to any
Leica owner. It has proved to be very useful and puts a new perspective
on everything. In fact, I used it for more than 70% of my Telluride
photos and now I can't see how I lived without it. It is sharp and
contrasty and even directly into the sun, the flare is not overly
objectionable. The 35mm summicron performed as expected and it always
gives me excellent results.  I feel these two lenses are perfect for
landscape photography and never thought I needed any other lens
(although at f4.5, I often wished it was a stop or two faster and I
also wish it could focus closer as well ...). In the late afternoon, I
found myself down to 1/15th and 1/30th shutter speeds with the lenses
wide open and still got good handheld pictures without camera shake. It
is these situations when I'm glad I've got a rangefinder rather than a
SLR.

At 10,000ft, the air is quite thin and hiking becomes strenuous.
Everest is 30,000ft and I can't imagine what that is like!  Bear
Creek and Jud Wiebe trails are short but scenic walks. Silver Lake is a
longer walk, and I was delighted to find the lake full of fat trout
that were very difficult to catch, however, in the end I got one on an
elk-haired caddis.

Some of my photos from this trip are on my www site at
http://www.cse.cuhk.edu.hk/~phwl/photos/telluride/telluride.html.
Also, some of my other fishing photos from Sydney, New Zealand and
other places (taken with a popular Japanese made SLR or my trusty
Olympus MJU) can be seen by following the links at
http://www.cse.cuhk.edu.hk/~phwl/fishing.html.

Regards,
Philip