County Road 12 is a well graded gravel road that starts on Colorado Highway 133 near Paonia Reservoir. It ascends to an altitude of about 10,000 feet at the top of Kebler Pass, before eventually dropping back down to the town of Crested Butte. It is home to one of the largest living organisms on the planet,the Kebler Pass aspen grove.

About 21.5 miles in from Paonia Reservoir or about 1.5 miles past the Horse Ranch Park turnoff is one of most colorful stands of aspen in all of Colorado. In a good color year, some of the aspens in this area get so red, they look like the sugar maples you see in New England. The picture seen above was taken in this area. I like to climb up about 30 feet, on a small open bank on the south side of the road. to get a good vantage point.

The best color for this location normally occurs in the last week of September.

Late afternoon on a day with partly cloudy skies. The shot above is a two shot panorama taken with the equivalent of a 300mm focal length lens on a 35mm full frame camera.

LENS: 70-300 mm on a full frame camera, 70-200mm on a crop sensor camera

FILTER: none needed

The Rainbow Conection ©Miles Hecker CLICK ABOVE IMAGE TO SEE GOOGLE MAP LOCATION
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FILMS	Slide films: Fuji Velvia 100