Curvy Autumn Road

by Mike Lee

Title

Curvy Autumn Road

Artist

Mike Lee

Medium

Photograph - Digital Photography

Description

One of my favorite times to look at fall colors is in the rain. The dampness can really make the vibrant colors pop! Therefore, on this drizzly early October day (2023) I felt compelled to go out exploring. I found colors starting to happen between 6 and 7 thousand feet in elevation in western Lassen County California. This was the scene as I approached Crater Lake which is around 7000 feet or so above sea level. The aspens that line the lake itself a mere 400 yards or so from this spot were still mostly green. This is common and the lakeshore leaves don’t typically take on full fall colors until these have mostly lost their leaves. My theory is that the lake water takes longer to cool than the air and a bit of a warmer “micro climate” is created along the lake. This could be total nonsense but it’s as good of a theory as I can come up with. In any event, I thought these colors along the windy road down to the lake were worth getting out of the truck for and contrasted nicely against all that lava rock (like the more famous and much larger Crater Lake in Oregon, “our” Crater Lake was formed by a volcano). I also find it interesting that the rabbit bush in this area blooms at about the same time the aspens turn and the blossoms are similar in color to the vibrant yellow aspen leaves.

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October 2nd, 2023

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