COSights

By Astrid · 7 places

Roads That Are the Destination

Passes, overlooks, and roads that are the destination

Some Colorado photographs are earned on foot and some through the windshield, waiting for the next pullout. These are the passes and overlooks I build whole days around, where the road itself keeps handing you compositions.

  1. Snow-streaked Red Mountain peaks rise above a dense dark-green forest, their rust-red and orange slopes glowing in warm afternoon light under a pastel blue-and-pink sky. A weathered mining trestle and scattered industrial ruins sit in the foreground, emphasizing the area’s mining history.
    1

    Ouray

    Million Dollar Highway - Red Mountain Pass

    Iron-stained peaks in vivid red and orange crowd the highway at 11,018 feet, with mining relics rusting into the same palette. The pullouts are narrow and few, which forces you to choose your stops like exposures.

  2. Trail Ridge Road curves along a rocky alpine ridge above a steep, forested canyon, with hazy mountain layers fading into a stormy sky. Low tundra and a few pink wildflowers edge the roadside in the foreground.
    2

    Estes Park

    Trail Ridge Road - Forest Canyon Overlook

    At 11,762 feet the overlook drops your eye into a glacially carved canyon with the Gorge Lakes strung along its far wall. It is the single stop on Trail Ridge that best explains what ice did to this range.

  3. Wide panoramic view from Independence Pass looking across a deep mountain valley toward layered brown peaks and dark evergreen slopes under a bright morning sky. The foreground shows alpine tundra with a few small hikers along the ridge, emphasizing the high-elevation, above-treeline landscape.
    3

    Aspen

    Independence Pass

    The hairpins on the Aspen side stack road, valley, and Sawatch peaks into layered frames, and the 12,095-foot summit puts you on open tundra. Come early; the summit lot is small and the light is better anyway.

  4. Wide panoramic view from Molas Pass Overlook, with the sun low over the left side of the frame and long light stretching across alpine slopes. Snow-dusted peaks and the Grenadier Range rise beyond the valley, while Molas Lake and the overlook road sit in the foreground under a sky streaked with dramatic clouds.
    4

    Silverton

    Molas Pass Overlook

    A paved pullout with the Grenadier Range arranged behind Molas Lake, which holds a reflection on calm mornings. The clouds here seem to perform on schedule; sunrise is the strong hand.

  5. A wide view from the overlook shows the broad, flat-topped Grand Mesa stretching across the horizon, with a long pale ridge and hazy mountains beyond. In the foreground, dark scrub-covered slopes drop toward the valley, and the warm golden-hour light softens the layered landscape under a clear blue sky.
    5

    Delta

    Grand Mesa - Land O' Lakes Overlook

    From the world's largest flat-topped mountain, the overlook surveys a plateau scattered with hundreds of lakes. Drive Highway 65 in late September and the mesa's aspen slopes go gold the whole way up.

  6. A wide view from Slumgullion Pass shows the pale yellow-green earthflow cutting across a steep mountainside, dotted with scattered evergreen trees and framed by dark forest in the foreground. Snowy peaks rise in the distance under a heavy, stormy sky.
    6

    Lake City

    Slumgullion Pass and Earthflow

    The overlook on Highway 149 faces an active landslide stained yellow-green against dark forest, one of the strangest color fields in the state. Pair it with Windy Point just down the road for Lake San Cristobal below.

  7. A paved two-lane road curves into a wide canyon beneath layered red rock cliffs and steep, scrub-covered slopes dotted with patches of snow. Clear blue afternoon sky and pale winter grass frame the rugged granite walls and scattered boulders along the roadside.
    7

    Grand Junction

    Unaweep-Tabeguache Scenic Byway - Unaweep Canyon

    Highway 141 runs through a canyon where two creeks flow in opposite directions beneath 1.7-billion-year-old granite capped in sandstone. The pulloffs near the divide have the biggest cliff exposures and the least company.

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