Riding Into the Sunset on Converging Paths

Interstates may seem a natural part of the American landscape, but the drone’s-eye view reveals the truth of how highways were laid atop the earlier landscape. I like the convergence of the headlights along both the country road and I-64, like two different eras running to a shared future.

Riding Into the Sunset on Converging Paths

Old and New Kentucky

While the Interstate system feels like an ingrained part of American culture at this point, its presence (in the Eastern U.S., anyway) is revealed as a late addition from a drone’s eye view: the original patterns of farms and country roads has this massive strip of highway laid atop it.

Old and New Kentucky

Dawn on Interstate 64

Good news, everyone! A new, much-lighter, yet equally capable drone (the DJI Mini 3 Pro) means aerial photography while traveling in a way that was never possible with my chunky Phantom 3.

In today’s image, northern Kentucky presents a classic American combination: old barns and farms, crossed by the monolithic expanse of the Interstate system.

Dawn on Interstate 64

Twentieth Century American West

Huge population growth in the American West led to a lot of new construction; I see the same thing in my remote area of Northern New York. Unlike up here, where storms and seasonal temperature cycles destroyed many of those structures after they were no longer useful, this partially inhabited area in Utah remains well-preserved.

Twentieth Century American West

Western Landscape I & II

Working through processing my back-catalog of sabbatical photos, I’ve finally come to the end of those I took in California. My semester of science and good food had come to an end, and now we drove back across the continent. The drive in December meant lots of snow-covered deserts and hillsides; summer was a bit different.

Western Landscape I

The human-made structures are as insignificant as you’d expect in the face of the great, empty American West.

Western Landscape II

Water in the Desert

From the Interstate across Nevada, the desert landscape astonishes me with its variety. Far from being a boring wasteland, the expanses of waving grasses, shrubs, shallow water, and rock hills provide a spectacular mixture. Even when I know the biology and ecology behind it, my east-coast-calibrated brain still can’t quite grasp that all of this water doesn’t equal trees.

Water in the Desert

Curves Into the Distance

Crossing the American West last winter, I was struck by the profound changes to the landscape affected by large-scale infrastructure programs. Rural electrification resulted in an expectation of electrical availability, and power lines now stretch to the horizon.

Sunset Lines

In much the same way, lines of Interstate highway curve off to the distance, twinned East and West streams.

Twins, East and West