This is the 4th in a series of posts using photos from a recent 6+ week trip around the Western US & Canada with a college buddy Chuck & my Australian Shepherd Gem, aka "the Mutt." I want to thank all who have looked at the first 3 parts & commented.

This post is intended to be a bit "tongue in cheek", e.g., fun & a departure from the prior posts, the shots were all taken "in town" … when my strong preferences are for scenic & wildlife shots. In fact Chuck, who is a good, well rounded photographer & pushes me hard to improve, has suggested (quite correctly I think) that I'm too narrow. I tend to try to avoid houses, roads, bridges, people, etc. in my shots, so these were all clearly taken outside my comfort zone.

After we left Sedona (last stop in Part 3), Chuck thought we should follow a suggestion I got in response to a post on UHH asking for recommended sights to shoot. A couple of fellow hoggers made strong cases for visiting Jerome, AZ, so that became our next "unplanned" (unscheduled) stop.

Jerome is built in the Black Hills on Cleopatra Hill & sits +/- 5,000 ft above sea level. It is a town that enjoyed much success during the days when copper mining & to a lesser degree gold, silver & other metals, were a big thing. According to Wikipedia, it was home to 10,000 people in the 1920's. Production at the mines fluctuated between booming during World War I, then falling & rising & falling again during and after the Great Depression. As ore deposits ran out, the mines closed & the population dwindled to fewer than 100 by the mid-1950s.

After the demise of mining, Jerome became something of a hard scrabble town as evidenced by abandoned cars & old mine shafts. Subsequently, the residents & new comers (population 444 per the 2010 census, although I believe it has grown substantially beyond that since then), have worked hard to reinvent Jerome & their efforts have created a new, vibrant & interesting town. I personally enjoyed visiting Jerome because much that I saw, tickled me.

So it was with a little bit of regret that we left Jerome for our next scheduled stop, which was Williams, AZ, where we planned to operate out of for a few days exploring the Grand Canyon. Williams was a surprise to me. It is located on Rt 66 & is another town that has overcome adversity (when the Interstate was routed around it). I thought it rivaled many of the sites we'd visited in OK & was a fitting last Rt 66 stop for our trip.

Our stay in Williams came near the end of our 2nd week on the road (can't believe we covered so much ground in 2 weeks) & as such makes for a nice breaking point. In order to give folks a break, after I submit this post, I'm going to hold off on further posts for a bit. However, I will start up again in a few days.

PS: Before I get to the photos, I want to again thank all who have commented on the past posts. Having retired from business 3 years ago, I'm a relatively new "returnee" to photography. In fact, I've never thought of myself as having an artsy bone in my body … & I'm often challenged just finding socks that match!!! So it is encouraging to get positive feedback from people as talented as those here on UHH.

Frank