Friday Skyday

We were beyond thrilled when we arrived at our new campsite outside Crested Butte to find clear skies! Based on our web research, Crested Butte looked like an island of drier weather in the midst of our rainy state - so we immediately made a beeline for it.

Our campsite had incredible wildflowers all around it with sunshine making them glow.

It also had a pond about 50 yards away! R perfected his takeoff technique over the coming days. Lift off...

... and flight!

Shyla was watching his technique, and we saw her take flight for the first time in her young life. After leaping and flying for her first time, Shyla decided that she loved it, and we saw her do this many times in the following days. The "butt up in the air" pose was Shyla's unique twist to the Lab diving technique.

On that first evening, the sunset was beautiful - even more than usual because we hadn't seen sunshine in days.

The few clouds in the sky dissipated after the sun went down. The stars twinkled overhead with the bright moon up just after sunset. It was so bright that it was tough to see shooting stars, although there is one short one toward the upper right of the photo. This photo was taken with the camera pointed to the east while the moon was still up.

Then, after the moon set, I programmed the camera to take photos while we slept. The camera took many 4 minute exposures (with 5 seconds breaks between them) over the course of two and a half hours. You can see how many more stars were visible without the moon in this photo than when the moon was out (above). The North Star is at the center of all those circles.

While my camera was making star photos, we drifted off to sleep, eagerly anticipating riding/running on the many gorgeous trails near us the next morning. It was amazing how sun and clear skies lifted our spirits!