Category Archives: Events

Impromptu airshow

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It’s been years since I’ve had the opportunity to attend a local airshow. But then a few weeks back I realized that during football season, people in the Denver area are given a free mini airshow before each Broncos (NFL) home game. There’s usually a military aircraft flyover for home game kickoffs and the pilots fly laps for about an hour to get the timing right for their flyover — and best of all for me, I live a short drive from where they circle.

Throw in a bit of help from the ADS-B Exchange, and it’s pretty easy to get lined up for some good shots (weather permitting).

All the photos in this post were taken with an OM-1 II camera and M.Zuiko 150-400mm + TC1.25x lens (at full zoom, so 1000mm in 35mm terms). Unfortunately, I had to crop all these shots due to distance; next time, I’ll remember to bring a teleconverter. And now that I’ve spotted some patterns in their flight path (it’s broadly similar from game to game, but shifts around by a few miles each time), I should be able to start getting closer. FWIW, these two aircraft are U. S. Navy EA-18Gs, the electronic warfare versions of F-18s.


At the northeast corner of the timing loop; a bit over 4 miles from me.
EXIF: ISO 200, f/5.6, 1/640 sec Continue reading →

Bright Nights at Four Mile

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So filed under the category of “How did I only now hear about this” is an excellent local (Denver, Colorado) event — “Bright Nights at Four Mile.” It’s a collaboration between Denver’s Four Mile Historic Park and Tianyu Arts & Culture, Inc., the largest producer of Chinese lantern festivals in North America. The result is a wide array of larger-than-life lit sculptures spread out over 12 acres. Great for photographers, fun for visitors of all ages, I just can’t praise it enough!

Miss Craigie, later Mrs. Reid

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Chalk art by Olivia McLeod (@blackbirdart) based on a painting by Allan Ramsay. Seen at the 2024 Denver Chalk Art Festival.

Miss Craigie, later Mrs. Reid

This won the “Best Reproduction of a Master’s Work” award at the festival. And it’s even a reproduction of a “local” painting — at least, it’s on display at the Denver Art Museum, just a few blocks from the site of the chalk art festival.

The photo above has been rectified, to show what it would have looked like from above. The non-rectified version looks like this: Continue reading →

Off to the (coffin) races!

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Every place you may go has its own little… quirks. One of the fun quirks to be found in Colorado’s Front Range is the annual Emma Crawford Coffin Races, held in Manitou Springs. As you might expect, it’s held in the days leading up to Halloween, and it commemorates a beloved former resident of the town.

Emma moved to Manitou Springs in 1899, hoping to find a cure for her tuberculosis in the town’s mineral springs. Sadly, the water didn’t work for her, and she died only two years later. Her dying wish was to be buried on top of the nearby Red Mountain, and so 12 hearty souls carried her casket up the mountain to fulfill that wish. But once again, her luck didn’t hold — after 3 decades of hard winters and spring rains, her coffin came racing down the mountainside in 1929. Since 1995, the local Chamber of Commerce has hosted the coffin races in her memory, and honestly, as an off-kilter fun event for the community (and lots of out-of-towners who drive in for it).

Emma Crawford Coffin Races & Festival
Emma Crawford Coffin Races & Festival
15 photos

Ullr in the storm

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A snow sculpture of Ullr, norse god of skiing, on display at the 2023 Breckenridge International Snow Sculpture Championships.
Ullr in the storm

As luck (good? bad?) would have it, our drive up to Breckenridge for the 1st public day of sculpture viewing coincided with the arrival of another storm front. Appropriate, I suppose, for a bunch of sculptures made from snow.