After photographing an abandoned mine mill near Animas Forks, CO, we drove back along a 4 wheel drive road towards Animas Forks, keeping an eye out for an abandoned truck we had been told about.
We soon spotted the truck a short distance up a spur road.
Wildflowers and clouds seem to be trying to comfort this old, rusting, abandoned truck in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains.
Later,
Ken
Silverton, Colorado is a picturesque old town nestled below Rocky Mountain peaks along U.S. 550 between Durango and Ouray. Silverton originated during mining boom times in the nearby mountains and was a rowdy place of saloons and bawdy houses, where the miners came to spend their wages, earned by their hard toiling in the mines.
It is now a major tourist attraction with lots of art galleries, antique shops, souvenir shops of all sorts and numerous restaurants and eating places to choose from. Nothing here is inexpensive, food or otherwise.
When we decided it was time to have lunch, most of the restaurants were crowded, including the limited outdoor seating, which we required, since we were traveling with a miniature labradoodle.
We ended up purchasing sandwiches from a food truck that had picnic tables and umbrellas for shade. The sandwiches were tasty. In talking to the lady working in the food truck, we discovered she and the food truck were from East Texas not so far from our home base. They trailer the food truck to Silverton for the tourist season, live in an RV, then back to Texas in the winter months. There were lots of Texans in Colorado. No doubt fleeing the excessively hot and dry summer in Texas this year.
Next up a spur of the moment decision to take a 4 wheel drive road to the ghost town of Animas Forks.
Let’s hope we don’t end up like this rusty truck in a Silverton alleyway.
Until then,
Ken
During our September, 2019 visit to Liberty, Kentucky, we stayed in a VRBO rental near Russel Springs, Kentucky and the Cumberland Lake. The rental was in the country about a 45 minute drive via country roads to Liberty. Nearly each day, we drove by an interesting looking country antique place. What initially caught my eye was an old, rusty Ford pickup truck out front with the sign “Sue’s” on it.
Late one day on our way past, I decided to stop to get an iPhone shot of the old truck. It was just after hours for the antique place, but the owner, Sue, saw us and came out to chat with us. She actually opened a couple of the small store units and let us look around.
Barbara bought a small item that she liked and I browsed around, mostly outside, shooting interesting objects around her stores.
Sue even told me to check her yard decor at her house next door to the antique stores and invited Barbara into her house to look at her antiques.
Sue had interesting yard decor with a definite country flair.
Sue had numerous old grinding wheels and grist mill wheels. These must have been a real chore to move around.
There is something very appealing, nostalgic and comforting about country yard decor such as Sue’s.
As I was browsing around Sue’s yard, her husband, a retired school bus driver, arrived after doing some tractor work for someone. We chatted about the old truck, which he had wanted to paint, but Sue did not want the truck painted, which I think is fortunate, as it looks quite appealing in its current rusty state. Sue’s husband showed me a photograph of an old automobile in a pasture, which he was acquiring from someone he knew. He said he would paint that old car, since he was forbidden to paint the old truck.
Before we got away, I was fortunate to get a sunset shot, although it is only via my iPhone, which does not handle the high light contrast very well.
Sue’s husband also had put small lights in the old truck’s headlight holes, so I got a shot of the truck with the light on at sunset.
It is always amazing to me how friendly our country people are and it is always a pleasant surprise to meet people like Sue and her husband.
That’s all for now,
Ken
