Going through my archives, I ran across this wonderful Milky Way photo that I previously shared on Flickr but not here. I took this in July 2014 on a trip to visit family in Pagosa Springs, Colorado at a spot I’ve returned to several times. On this particular night, I got incredibly lucky with finding a location that so neatly captured the Milky Way in such a great orientation.

I wrote before about my trip to New York City to visit my friends Amy and Matt, although I can’t believe this was now 10 years ago! Time flies, and it feels like just yesterday that we were wandering Times Square looking for photo opportunities. I found this scene on Broadway and 46th (in the same area as the Statue of Liberty photo I posted before) on an evening when Times Square was buzzing and alive with summertime tourists.

This is one of my favorite photos from recent years because it really captures the beauty of the Milky Way from a remarkable location. My cousin (the very talented Allison Otto) and I had been scoping out good weekends to take Milky Way photos from somewhere in the Colorado Rockies, but our schedules never quite aligned to make it happen. So when my wife suggested a trip to Aspen on one of those weekends, I already knew it would be a good opportunity to see the stars from nearby Independence Pass. While Aspen is certainly beautiful, Independence Pass is a marvel and one of the most spectacular passes in Colorado.

Whenever I visit my family in Colorado, I always look forward to taking night photos. On the same trip where I took my Snowball Road photo in 2011, I also took a drive down nearby Piedra Road to see if I could find any good shots. I discovered this wonderful little barn on that road (it’s almost a shed), and it’s been a go-to source of photos for me for many trips since.

Taking astrophotos can be a challenge – you need to be in the right place (dark skies) at the right time (little moonlight) with the right weather (no clouds) at the right time of year (the Milky Way is only visible in the warmer months of the Northern Hemisphere). Fortunately, all of this worked in my favor on my backpacking trip to Quartz Lake in August, letting me take a truly dream come true photo of Mars and the Milky Way together in the night sky. There was a reason I lugged all of my heavy camera gear up and over a mountain pass, and this was it.