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On Location: Portraits of Tucson, Arizona
With a population of over a half million people, there is definitely no shortage of portraits to be painted in Tucson, Arizona. Even with a burgeoning number of inhabitants, to a non-desert dweller, I was drawn (literally) to create portraits of the other population in Tucson, the cacti! The majestic saguaro cactus is hard to miss around town. Not only are they quite tall (some can grow to be over 70 feet tall), but they also could easily hold the title for most recognizable icon of the Wild West. Ironically they do not grow throughout the West, but Tucson is lucky to be one of the few regions it thrives. In fact, it is so prevalent in…
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Free Printable Vintage Wild West Post Card
If you’ve ever seen a satellite image of the US at night, it’s clear to see why they call the western portion of America the “wild west.” The Eastern seaboard is light up like a Christmas tree with city lights. The West coast (Los Angeles and San Francisco) is just as bright, but head east of California’s central valley and west of St. Louis, and there sure is a lot of wide open space! In the spirit of the rugged wild west, I’ve made a free printable vintage-style post card based on one of the images I took in Southern Utah along the Colorado river. I’d imagine if I were…
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Time+Place: Wild West Horseback Riding in Utah
It was a gorgeous summer afternoon in Southern Utah. The rusted reds in the sandstone cliffs reverberated against the cerulean blue skies. We got on our horses, left the stables of the resort, and slowly moseyed up the mountain side away from the mighty Colorado River. Within minutes the only sounds we could hear were the hoofs of our horses trundling up the rocky trail. With each step, it felt like we were heading back in time– straight into an old western movie. There is nothing like the landscape of the American Southwest. The sandstone buttes jutting out from the desert landscape is an iconic scene in almost any Western…
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On Location: Rocky Mountain High – Solitude at 10,000′ in Fairplay Colorado
Past bustling Frisco, Colorado, through the ski town of Breckenridge and over 11,542′ Hoosier Pass lies the little town of Fairplay, Colorado. Situated on a high grassland basin known as South Park (yes, the South Park… more on this later), you definitely get the feeling that John Denver must have visited Fairplay before he wrote his famous ballad, Rocky Mountain High. There are the “cathedral mountains” and the “silver clouds”, there’s the starlight sky, and the streams. But most of all I found the “quiet solitude.” Perhaps the solitude was unique to when I visited, I can’t be sure, but this small town of less than 700 people, situated in…
Illustrating Experiences & Inspiring Adventures
