We ventured up the Poudre Canyon this weekend to do a moderate hike of summiting Mount McConnel. We last did this hike in 2020, which had very different scenery than this time. In 2020, the area was still scarred from the 2012 High Park Fire. Now that a little more time has passed, a lot of the charred trees are more decomposed and it just looks like barren hillsides with not much on them at all. But the lack of trees provided great visibility of the surrounding mountains.

The park rangers in this area have done much work on this trail since we were here last. I remember having to go over several large fallen trees when we hiked this in 2020, but this time the trail was completely cleared.

This was a perfect hike. The weather was fabulous and we didn't see a single other hiker. I know this isn't the most popular of trails, but I expected to see at least a few other groups because of the weather. I'm not complaining, I love having this trail all to ourselves today.

I got to go to Chicago for a business trip to go to Pack Expo International, a giant conference at McCormick Place. The hotels were outrageous, so instead I found an Airbnb that had decent rates as well as rooftop access. I've always wanted to do some photography from a rooftop in a city but never get the option when staying at a hotel. Unfortunately, I had to pack light so I didn't have a tripod. Coupled with waking up very early for the flight out there and walking over 10 miles at the conference on the first day, I didn't spend as much time on the rooftop as I would have wanted to. But I got a few shots in and it was fun nonetheless.

I had some time on the day flying back home to walk around the city a little and do some architectural photography. This type of photography is a lot different than the normal landscapes I do, but I didn't have much time to take photos before heading to the airport.