West fork of the Santa Barbara, July 15, 2016

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I’m on my own today.  My hiking, fishing and photo buddies are busy so I have the choice of deciding where I want to go today.  I have a few places on my list so I feel the need to check one of them off.  Santa Barbara River in the northern portion of the Pecos Wilderness is my choice for the day.

Rio Cebolla,June 7

This time Byron came with me to catch some native cutthroat trout.

When I told him about running into a fly fisherman on my previous trip and learning about the cutthroats being up above the pond he was all over it.  He had to catch....

Valles Caldera hike

Penstemons

Earlier this year I wrote about the Valles Caldera, VC, and how I was going to get back for more hiking.  In late May we had several forest fires go through the area one of which went through a portion of the VC.  The VC closed around Memorial Day weekend and I wasn’t certain when it would open again.  Around mid July I looked at their calendar and saw they had just opened up and they were hosting their ‘Wildflowers’ guided hike.  I wanted to make this hike hoping to see many wildflowers in the VC so I made my reservation….

Tell A Story

I hang around a lot of different photographer’s blogs and the main message I take away from each of them is to tell a story with your photos.  Layne Kennedy in particular says to tell your story in three photographs.