Mancos State Park

Author's Comments

At 7,800 feet, the morning air at Jackson Gulch carries a particular stillness that I have come to associate with smaller reservoirs in the southwestern part of the state. Mancos is not a destination park. It is a place people pass on their way to Mesa Verde, and that fact has kept it quiet in a way I am grateful for. The reflection shot is the obvious one. The La Plata Mountains rise behind the eastern shore, and on a windless morning in late September the reservoir holds them almost perfectly. I have stood on that shore at first light and watched the peaks appear in the water before they fully resolved in the sky, the way mountains sometimes do when the light is still deciding what kind of day it wants to be. But the park rewards a slower walk than that. The Gambel oak goes copper in October, and the ponderosa stands hold their own quieter color year round. There are pockets along the western shore where the forest comes right down to the water and the composition becomes something other than mountain-and-mirror. Wildlife moves through in the early hours. I have seen mule deer at the waterline more often than not. Come at golden hour if you want the postcard. Come before the sun is fully up if you want the reflection to hold. Either way, you will likely have the shore to yourself, which is a thing worth saying out loud about a place this beautiful.

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