Downtown Knoxville in Fall Colors

If you’ve already caught my Five Favorite Photos of 2021 post, then you’ve seen this image already – it was one of my favorites of last year, and one that I hadn’t gotten around to publishing just yet.  In that post, however, I don’t spend much time talking about the images, so now you get to hear the rest of the story, as Paul Harvey used to say!  I’ll start with the name – the Lost Dutchman.  While I was in Phoenix this past year, I had a bit of time one afternoon so I decided to go for a little walk.  After doing some digging, I landed on a trail in the Superstition Mountains.  This particular trail wound through a corner of Tonto National Forest and The Lost Dutchman State Park, the name of the latter I found interesting.

One of the things I’ve always found fascinating about the history of the American west were the gold rushes, and with them, the crazy stories and legends of fortunes found and lost.  Well as it turns out, the park is named after, not a lost Dutchman himself, but rather his lost gold mine!  You can read the story here, but the gist of it is that somewhere in the general area is believed to be a lost gold mine, and thousands of people per year come to the area to look for it; now well over a hundred years since the Dutchman died and took the secret of his mine’s location with him.

I may not have found a mine, but I did find gold in the way of an image that I really love!  As I was walking out, I was legitimately trying to hurry because I was losing light fast, and not being familiar with the area I didn’t want to go missing myself!  The light was amazing though, and the ominous clouds rolling in made for a very moody scene!  The lightning strike was an added bonus, which I didn’t even notice until I got home and realized I randomly captured it!

More next week!

–Dan Thompson

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