Frisco Bay Marina

Author's Comments

There is a window at Frisco Bay, maybe forty minutes long, that I keep setting alarms for. It opens before sunrise, when the water on the western arm of Dillon Reservoir has gone completely still and the Tenmile Range is still a silhouette against a sky that has not yet decided what color it will be. Then the first light hits Peak One, and the marina wakes up in reverse, the mountains lighting before the boats do. The sailboats matter here. They give the foreground something to do, and their masts make verticals that the eye can use to step into the frame. In summer the fleet is full and the reflections are dense with rigging. In fall the bay thins out and the compositions get quieter, which I sometimes prefer. Wind is the variable. The reflection holds until somewhere around eight or nine in the morning, depending on the day, and once it goes it does not come back until evening. I have driven up from the Front Range, set up in the dark, and watched the surface stay glass long enough to make the wide shot, the tighter detail of a single hull doubled in the water, and then a final frame as the breeze moved in and broke everything into pieces. That is the rhythm of the place. Arrive early. Work fast in the soft light. Then walk the path toward the historic park while the day opens up around you.

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