Trip rewind: Day two

Day two was Silverton! Which came complete with driving along the million dollar highway. I had wanted to drive that with Dan, but it was just another one of those things we never got around to doing together. The drive was gorgeous, though. I thought about Dan quite frequently throughout it.

When we got to Silverton, it was damn near empty. But so fucking precious. I loved it. I tried to take some photos of the town from a stop off on the highway, but I'm not sure how they turned out. They didn't really grab my attention, so I didn't bother to inspect them.

All of the mines were essentially closed because of the snow. We could have trekked up there....if there had been any handy snow equipment. We voted on a drive up to the Christ of the Mine shrine, but it was so muddy and narrow that we turned around and drove around the town instead. Behold!

I sort of fell in love with the unloved, unkept state of all of the buildings in Silverton. It looked like everything was just waiting for someone to breathe life into them again. I found myself wondering if the city let itself become run down during the off months before sprucing itself up for company.

We were given a piece of paper from the lady at the visitor's center with all of the open restaurants and stores (approximately five! Commerce!), and we voted on which one to eat at. We settled on this HORRIBLE place called The Pickle Barrel (and afterwards, chastised ourselves for not going to the place with the fry bread). I got an open faced turkey sandwich that didn't advertise being smothered in gravy, but was, anyway. At least I hope it was gravy. It was foul. I could have said fowl, but that place doesn't deserve puns. Just shame. And maybe the health department's first ever J-rating. I DID love the tacky tablecloth, though. It was so ugly!

I wanted to thieve that sugar bowl (which is a long and glorious tradition in my family. My personal favorite sugar bowl that was stolen is from Cornell), but I didn't. I wanted to creep on everybody, but the local yokels were having none of my shenanigans, and watched me like a hawk anytime I pointed my camera in their general vicinity. I instead spied an empty table covered with papers, and I was so immediately taken with it. I took two shots: one to get the lighting right (which I nailed first try) and one to actually get the shot.

It was my favorite shot of the day. I don't know why. Maybe it was again because it looked lonely and abandoned. I didn't see anybody sit at the table, and we were there for at least an hour. I did it in monochrome, as well, but I don't like that version. I like this one.

After the disastrous food affair at The Pickle Barrel, it was time to drive the Silverton roads that we COULD drive on. We took the road all the way to the end and saw an abandoned mine up on the side of a mountain. I didn't get any good shots of that, but I did enjoy the mountain it was next to!

The weather was glorious. I'd say it was about 45 degrees out, wonderfully sunny, and with perfect clouds. I was so happy, despite all of the driving (driving for extended periods makes everybody miserable. I'm no exception). We had driven by an abandoned processing mill type thing that looked very, very closed (and also infested with ebola), but it had such a lovely, interesting color and texture. The gate was open on the way back, which is obviously an invitation to drive right inside!

They're more than a little washed out, but I did that on purpose. I wanted enough color in there to make them interesting, but with that condemned, keep the fuck out feel still hanging out.

There was one more drive through Silverton to take pictures of the train cars. I...um...wasn't wearing snow-appropriate shoes (if you didn't read that as 'flip-flops', you should have), so I had to stay behind. But I busied myself taking pictures of a weather metal barn door:

Only one more picture from day two, I promise!

Dinner was Steamworks again, because it is SO fucking delicious, I don't think I could ever get tired of eating there. I even had some beer! An IPA, of all things! It was called Conductor, and holy shit, is it tasty. For beer, at any rate. I had more than a few sips.

Night shoot!

This was on the 50, in the middle of the night. In pitch darkness (which is exactly how it should have been). No cars passed by the pull off spot while we were shooting, so no light interrupted anybody's shots. I got super cold super fast, but I did manage to take this picture:

It's nothing fancy, but I loved it. That entire shoot, while freezing and not productive for me, was still wonderful.