[Leica] Great Sand Dunes National Park

[Robert Adler]

Ugghhh! I was thinking of lugging the 30lbs worth of medium format along...
Doesn't sound wise, but so hard to resist...
Did you ever go over to the other side (north side I think)?


On Fri, Aug 8, 2014 at 4:41 PM, Aram Langhans <leica_r8 at hotmail.com> wrote:

> Love that place and your pictures are great.  But did you hike to the top?
> I timed some of it.  About half way up is a sort of level area and that is
> where my wife pooped out.  That was at about 250 feet.   I went from there,
> stopping in a few places to photograph, and it took me 45 minutes to slog
> up, two steps forward, one step back.  I was exhausted but thrilled to be
> at
> the top of the High Dune on the first ridge.   They say it is 700', but it
> was the hardest 700' I ever did.  Rested at the top and took some photos,
> then turned to go down.  I packed my camera carefully in a case and under
> my
> windbreaker in case I fell, then off I went.  I timed it, too.  It took
> less
> than 4 minutes to get back to her.  Each step with the sliding down was
> probably 15-20 feet.  It was like skiing.  Amazing and fun.
>
> Aram
>
> Aram Langhans
> (Semi) Retired  Science Teacher
> & Unemployed photographer
>
> “The Human Genome Project has proved Darwin more right than Darwin himself
> would ever have dared dream.”   James D. Watson
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Howard Ritter [mailto:hlritter at bex.net]
> Sent: Thursday, August 07, 2014 9:47 PM
> To: Leica Users Group; MUGers at yahoogroups.com
> Subject: [Leica] Great Sand Dunes National Park
>
> We’re currently finishing up our first major (3 weeks) RV trip. One of the
> most memorable stops was at Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve in
> Colorado. Here prodigious amounts of sand produced over eons by erosion of
> the San Luis Mountains has been carried by prevailing westerly winds across
> the San Luis Valley, eventually getting deposited as the wind becomes
> turbulent at the foot of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. Easterly winter
> winds push the sand back down off the mountains so that it has accumulated
> in a field miles across and about 225 m/750ft high. From up close at the
> base, the dune field is awesome (in the old sense, before the word was
> bleached of its meaning), massive, serene, dwarfing even the cloud shadows
> that fall on it.
>
> Here is a link to my favorite several images:
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/hlritter/dunes/
>
> All shot with my favorite grab-and-go camera, the Sony NEX7. I was unsure
> about trusting $20K worth of M240 and lenses to the security of an RV for
> several weeks, but I think that caution was unnecessary. Anyway, this way I
> could use a circular polarizer, which I routinely use for landscapes,
> especially when blue sky is in the picture.
>
> C&C solicited and welcomed.
>
> —howard
>
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>



-- 
Bob Adler