dawn in Denver

sunrise:  7:16          blog time remaining:  12 days
Denver, Colorado

It has been a little while since my last city sunrise. As I have discovered throughout this year, finding the dawn in a city is always a bit of a challenge. Nevertheless, Denver gave us some beautiful and unexpected scenes.

Since we are still on eastern time, J and I both woke up early. We started off toward the capital building well before dawn. J’s dad was born and bred in Colorado, and J’s parents lived here for a while when they were first married. So this city and the mountains where we’re headed on Monday are filled with his family history and memories of Papa. The State House steps are part of those recollections. J remembers visiting with his dad and finding the mile-high marker on one of the western facing steps.

There was an intensely bright planet (I assume it must be a planet) shining in the southeast (see it over the top of the capital dome?). Since it was still quite dark, we got a nice shot of that “morning star.” Is it Venus? SO bright – maybe because of our altitude.

It is an impressive city all around. The kids are all at A’s apartment, but J and I are in a hotel at the end of the “16th St. mall,” a mile long pedestrian boulevard with a free shuttle. Everything is quite beautiful with Christmas lights.

The capital area looks grandly out upon the vista of the Rocky Mountains – or just the foothills to the Rockies. It is interesting that they chose to orient the building toward the west, the region of expansion and exploration, frontier and discovery, wilderness and challenge. The nature of historical perspective is quite different out here than it is on the east coast, where the feel of old Europe and early trans-Atlantic settlers dominates the scene.

eastern view

western view

Inscription on one of the western facing steps of the capital:

J is not so used to these early morning walks. Plus, he didn’t go through a stretching routine this morning. So he took a little break along the way.

He has never been terribly self-conscious. It’s probably a good thing that our kids weren’t with us at this moment. “Dad! What are you DOING!” (Notice the duct-taped sneakers. He is a frugal man)

Here are a few scenes of the eastern glow and pinking of the sky. Some of the best views today, as often happens, were the transfer glow of dawn in the west.

The sunlight hits the distant mountain tops and the tops of city buildings before it reaches us down on the ground. Our first view of the sun itself was actually the sun’s reflection.

Near our hotel is the Denver Post building, where a neon marquis continuously circulates local and national news headlines. Here is good news about the mountains, where we’re headed for some skiing tomorrow.