Photography by Mike Mander | 2009 / Green River & North to Oregon

That's it... time to head home. After a morning (1-7) spent exploring near the Green River (3-4), I felt quite under the weather for some reason, and so we did not hike to a very neat looking arch (7), rather deciding to simply start heading northward. I did a lot of driving in the next few days and not much photography. The main highway that heads west from Green River passes through the amazing San Rafael Swell (8-10) but since we wanted to make time, only a stop by the side of the road was made. The next shots (11-13) are of a "shoe tree" in Nevada where passers-by, including Bill (13), fling old pairs of shoes and sandels, hoping they will catch and decorate the tree. Further along, on a backroad (14-17) north of Gerlach, Nevada, we were treated to some beautiful clouds once again, something that all-too-rarely happened on the trip. A note of interest is that sometimes cattle-guards are actually just painted (16) onto the road. Presumably just the lines and the real steel side-gates are enough to make cattle believe it is a "real" cattle-guard? I reckon them cows are none too swift. I have seen many of these on my travels in the US, so this isn't just a one-time thing! Finally the last shots are in Oregon: a mossy tree at a campground (18), a flock of flying pelicans (19), a hawk (20) and lastly some shots at the Christmas Valley Sand Dunes (21-25, where I severely burned the sole of my right foot... a long story!) end the saga of my 2009 Southwest trip. A total of 440 images in 8 galleries - I hope you enjoyed the show!