It was the end of a glorious day in Colorado. The sun was going in and out behind some clouds in the western sky. Before the sun dropped behind a mountain range, it came out of the clouds and lit up this row of aspen. Perfect!

It was the first day of a four day fall color photo safari I was leading in Colorado. We met in Denver at 6:30 am and headed south on US 285. We stopped at various place along the highway to take pictures, including some not very well know spots off on some country roads.

South of Poncha Springs, Colorado we turned west to go over Marshall Pass. We spent 4 hours photographing aspen groves and mountains. At 4 pm we were having lunch in Sargents, Colorado at the Tomichi Creek Trading Post (which is a great place to eat). We drove west to Gunnison and north up Ohio Pass (take CO 135 north out of Gunnison and then turn off to the left on County Road 730), taking pictures along the way. We found this particular aspen grove near a parking lot (22 miles north of Gunnison) and waited for the sun to pop out of the clouds. Then we drove on up to the top of Ohio Pass and turned east on Kebler Pass (County Road 12) to Crested Butte. It was night as we drove south back to Gunnison and then west to our motel in Montrose, Colorado.

Marshall Pass and Ohio Pass are both excellent fall color locations in late September or early October.

The first day of the photo safari we covered 322 miles and stopped at 17 photo locations.

Photo Data: Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 100-400mm Mark II lens at 188mm. f8, 1/200 second, ISO 100.