Ruby Creek Press
... is a landing place for pictures I’ve taken en route, while moving or traveling. I live in Salida, Colorado (in the Rockies, about 3 hours south of Denver). Many of the photos were taken in Colorado, both north & south. But you’ll find a few shots from Indiana, Idaho, New Mexico, & Washington state. There’s no real theme to this page. Just excerpts for a visual diary, an attempt to save & share what I’ve seen and liked.
There’s no real order either.
My apologies ~ I know jumping around in time & place can be disorienting.
But to some extent, this is how these experiences live in my head.
A note about the combined photos ~ a friend pointed out the lack of people in my pictures. It’s true. Usually I’m not brave enough to take a picture of a stranger. I don’t want to intrude. And my math isn’t good enough to quickly set my camera for moving objects. So, I added a few family members (pictures taken by me or someone else) to some of my landscapes. I don’t know that it works, but it’s been fun trying.
Many of the pictures on this page were taken in Salida, or nearby. Like many mountain towns in Colorado, Salida is busy growing & changing. But there’s still much left of the early times. The alleys aren’t paved yet, just dirt. There’s a lot going on there. Building ADU’s in the alleys, but people living in the old structures too.
I’ve always wanted to do something with this photo of nighttime Saguache. There wasn’t much in the shot. So, I added my grandparents. I don’t know that they ever made it to Saguache on their own. Below is a picture of my sisters (twins) taken by my father in Denver. I added them to a photo of an old gate in downtown Saguache.
This house is no longer standing. There had been just a shell left anyway ~ Salida
When i first got to Salida 11 years ago, I rode everywhere & was real excited when i found this in Smeltertown
It was seasonal ~ the neighbor’s elm branches crashed into our yard. The wind can be formidable in salida.
The branches were beautiful, like lace
This is a river town. The kayak is now gone but the stucco house is still standing & occupied
The antique store, seen from my apartment on the main street in Lafayette, IndianaThe recycling yard where Jamie’s youth bike mentoring program met to build double decker bikes and parade out through town and cross country every Saturday, regardless of weather or attendanceI loved the shadow. The sun is a gift here. A friend gave me the candleabra One of the donkeys I met on a bike ride outside Saguache, in the San Luis ValleyMy younger sister, added to a rotated shot of S Hill balls left on the roof of the Bbox of Bubbles roof
On a 6am bike ride in Salida during a hoar frost
The Botanical Garden, DenverI stayed in Saguache for two weeks testing the cold, wondering if I could manage living there through a winter & beyond. It wasn’t a problem. What used to be one of the coldest towns in Colorado, had become normal for the high desert due to climate change
Downtown Salida next to the liquor store. It’s looked like this for the 11 years I’ve been here. That’s unusual
The dead tree next to my first apartment in Salida, next to the evangelical & Latter Day Saints churches. The dead tree is now gone
In the Salida cemetery. That’s an old place that seemingly hasn’t been harmed by development
Hikers on the Green’s Creek Trail (I think that’s where this was)Half-a-cow. This one begs for a family member, though I kind of like the unpopulated distance between plow & end-of-cow
Dean’s back yard in downtown Saguache
The path around Franz Lake, Salida
On the way to the Climax Mine near Leadville, Colorado
From my Denver hotel windowBD at Independence Pass on the way to Aspen
Downtown Denver
One of the alley buildings in Salida & a rare cloudy day
An alley in downtown Salida
My bike at the crest of HWY 285 going south out of Saguache in the San Luis Valley
The Smeltertown smokestack in Salida. Once a smelter, then a super fund site, now a landmark
Our G Street house in Salida, the backyard. Ed & Anna did an incredible landscaping job
The Saguache Diner, a very diverse gathering spot, ranchers & ranch hands, & everyone elseA composite picture: onlookers at the Hooligan Race during FibArk in Salida, while BD & I watch on the shore of the Snake River in Idaho
My mother superimposed on one of my shots of the San Luis Valley. My dad took her picture in 1950s Denver. I don’t know if they ever got to the Valley. Mom was from rural Texas
Salida, but I think of those condos in the distance, now old enough to be natives, as having a New Mexico flavor
San Luis Valley outside Saguache. I thought of implanting a relative, but the expanse is enough as is. Be sure to click on this to see it large
My great aunt & uncle in Texas, superimposed on my favorite door in Saguache, Colorado
Salida’s gun shop, now gone or re-imagined
The linotype at the Crescent newspaper in Saguache, one of the few active lintotypes in the country
Downtown Lafayette, Indiana as seen from my Main Street apartment
Self portrait taken in Rick’s Antiques, Etc. in Saguache. Lots of treasures there, including the old building
My neighbor in full regalia, SaguacheMy neighbor’s mixed media piecesMy sisters, “the twins” in Denver (my dad’s shot), superimposed by me on a photo of an old gate in SaguacheMy bed, SalidaOne of several hiking groups, near town, SalidaMy windchimes out back on E Street, Salida. It was a funky backyard. I rarely went this far backThis is up S Hill. I liked the flow of hilltop & rocksThe road down to the HWY 291, near the Salida hospital, Chalk Cliffs in the distanceI think this is the Green’s Creek trail, near SalidaOne of my favorite shots of the San Luis valley. I always wanted to live out there somewhere, but only got as far as downtown SaguacheDean’s window, downtown Saguache, Magpie GalleryThe other cemetery outside SaguacheOn a walk, a crossroads outside SaguacheSaguache Creek, near downtownMy grandparents superimposed on dowtown Saguache on a very cold nightHomestead outside SaguacheOld radiators, Saguache Hotel before renovations