THE Citizen is so grateful for you, our members and contributors, for helping make this daily website a reality. And we were overwhelmed with the beautiful photos submitted to our “Thankful to live in the Valley” gallery. Take a look and see this wonderful place through the eyes of those who love it.
THE Elephant Rocks BLM area (foreground) on the west side of the Valley offers unlimited trails for adventuring in hiking, biking and cross country skiing, while the magnificent Sangre de Cristos (in the distance) provide mountain climbing and hiking challenges not for the faint of heart (or inexperienced). In between these two mountain ranges lies the Valley floor, with a variety of plentiful crops to feed both humans and animals.
– John McEvoy (johnmcevoyphoto.com)
Family!! – RoseMarie Vanderpool
Dewey Do Naughty the adventurer at the Old Stone Quarry! – Joann White
The views from my porch. – Scott Manfri
Dewey Do Naughty the adventurer at the Old Stone Quarry! – Joann White
The views from my porch. – Scott Manfri
THE beauty of the Valley requires NO FILTER! How lucky we are to live in such a gorgeous place!
– Connie Robinson
I’M so thankful to finally live here after finding myself drawn to this mystical valley, time and time again throughout my life. – Barb Reed
I’M grateful for moonlight glowing behind clouds, brightening the night dark sky over the mountains. – Jean Alger
I am so proud to be a member of the GFWC Woman’s Citizenship Club of Alamosa serving our community since 1922 by “Living the Volunteer Spirit.” – Theresa Rudder
My back yard today. – Diana Bubard-Hall
I’M grateful for moonlight glowing behind clouds, brightening the night dark sky over the mountains. – Jean Alger
I am so proud to be a member of the GFWC Woman’s Citizenship Club of Alamosa serving our community since 1922 by “Living the Volunteer Spirit.” – Theresa Rudder
My back yard today – Diana Bubard-Hall
Nancy J Morlan
Casey Graham
Nancy J Morlan
Casey Graham
THE promise of the Theatre being built brought me here and its realization has connected me to the SLV. – John H. Taylor
ALAMOSA School District Child Nutrition Director Gwyn Smith and Ruth Frye, child nutrition lead, with the cafeteria staffs at Alamosa Elementary, Ortega Middle and Alamosa High. We’re thankful for all their hard work and all the healthy and nutritious food they prepare for our students. – OMS
My Love. – Chris Lopez
I’m thankful for our local independent book coop! – Ally Stone
WE’RE thankful for the sunsets, and the memories of those we had a chance to share them with. Jake’s Mom and his stepdad (who passed away suddenly, recently) on one of their many pilgrimages to the valley to see us.
– Jessica Larriva and Jake Gefell
The night skies are always wonderful. – San Mon
My amazing husband, Ernie, who died in March.
– Charli Mondragón
Bev DeVore
Teotenantzin Ruybal
Dionne Allen
THESE early morning winter runs … the landscape is transformed and I love the sounds of the nearly frozen Rio Grande.
– Mike Henderson
THESE early morning winter runs … the landscape is transformed and I love the sounds of the nearly frozen Rio Grande.
– Mike Henderson
THANKFUL to live in a place filled with opportunities for adventures with my friends and family. – Aaron Miltenberger
GRATEFUL, Blessed and Thankful to live in the Valley because we can take our beautiful granddaughters to enjoy a day of fishing, chasing butterflies, and munching on lunch at Beaver Creek Reservoir. – Susan M. Valdez
THANKFUL to live in a place filled with opportunities for adventures with my friends and family. – Aaron Miltenberger
GRATEFUL, Blessed and Thankful to live in the Valley because we can take our beautiful granddaughters to enjoy a day of fishing, chasing butterflies, and munching on lunch at Beaver Creek Reservoir. – Susan M. Valdez
I’M thankful for Great Sand Dunes National Park where we can literally get some perspective on the Valley. This photo was taken during a cross-country hike along the spine of the park in the summer of 2022, showing the dunes at sunset. – Chris Ray
“For my self it is the natural bounty of beauty presented on a daily basis.” – catsxdwight
The Rio Grande in our backyard and the summer nights.
– Roman G. Martinez
“For my self it is the natural bounty of beauty presented on a daily basis.” – catsxdwight
The Rio Grande in our backyard and the summer nights.
– Roman G. Martinez
Thankful for this girl and her relentless love for the outdoors. – MaryAnne Talbott
The amazing scenery everywhere to photograph! – Kevin Milder
This is why I love the Valley: beautiful sunrises and sunsets. – Eli N Sherry Martinez
A wonderful summer night. – Dianna Gutierrez Marquez
Timothy Hastey
I’m very thankful for my cat! He just exists and has no idea how much he matters to the family and me. He is the first thing I want to see when I get back home and the only dude I want to chill with. – Oliver Heckman
I’m very thankful for my cat! He just exists and has no idea how much he matters to the family and me. He is the first thing I want to see when I get back home and the only dude I want to chill with. – Oliver Heckman
SO thankful for the water that greens up our Valley, grows grass and crops, sustains wildlife habitat, and provides wonderful experiences of beauty and adventure, on foot, on skis, in boats, and more. While our water is scarce and, according to abundant data, becoming even more scarce, I treasure the snow that piles up in our mountains in winter, and then with the coming of spring, melts and flows down our streams and rivers, refills our aquifers, sustains our lives and livelihoods and brings the Valley community together to care for it and secure our water for the future. Agua es vida! Photo – Water diverted from the Rio Grande serves working lands and sustains wildlife habitat, on the Colville’s Corset Ranch on the river, west of Del Norte. – Rio de la Vista
SO thankful for the water that greens up our Valley, grows grass and crops, sustains wildlife habitat, and provides wonderful experiences of beauty and adventure, on foot, on skis, in boats, and more. While our water is scarce and, according to abundant data, becoming even more scarce, I treasure the snow that piles up in our mountains in winter, and then with the coming of spring, melts and flows down our streams and rivers, refills our aquifers, sustains our lives and livelihoods and brings the Valley community together to care for it and secure our water for the future. Agua es vida! Photo – Water diverted from the Rio Grande serves working lands and sustains wildlife habitat, on the Colville’s Corset Ranch on the river, west of Del Norte. – Rio de la Vista
THANKFUL for farming in the San Luis Valley, and water. This photo was taken on our farm south of Alamosa. With beautiful Mt. Blanca in the back ground and a hawk perched on the sprinkler. Thankful that I can look out my back door and see this.
– Cathy Simpson
THANKFUL for farming in the San Luis Valley, and water. This photo was taken on our farm south of Alamosa. With beautiful Mt. Blanca in the back ground and a hawk perched on the sprinkler. Thankful that I can look out my back door and see this.
– Cathy Simpson
SEEINGthe sun peek out from behind Blanca Massive every morning to greet me on my drive to work. – Chrissy McKinney
Jo Moore
WHETHER you are from here or not there is a certain magical feeling just cannot shake about this place. It wraps you in its arms and you’re never quite the same. This photo was taken from the San Luis Valley Regional Airport in Alamosa Colorado and features a runway line leading you to Mt. Blanca under a gorgeous sky. – Larry J Vigil
WHETHER you are from here or not there is a certain magical feeling just cannot shake about this place. It wraps you in its arms and you’re never quite the same. This photo was taken from the San Luis Valley Regional Airport in Alamosa Colorado and features a runway line leading you to Mt. Blanca under a gorgeous sky. – Larry J Vigil
Beautiful mountains, wonderful people. – Mary Jones
Changing of the Seasons in the Mountains of Colorado: San Luis Valley
I can smell the seasons changing with the slight hint of impending winter. There is a newfound crispness to the air, an elemental earthiness. It meshes and infuses itself with the wholly magical freshness of mountain air made purer by the cold. The wind blows and the Aspen trees shake their branches in effort to cleanse themselves of old growth – sending magnificent soft and crispy leaves in familiar shapes twirling in an ancient and cyclical dance, and clothing the welcoming ground in a manifold array of crimson, orange, and yellow hues. The exhausted land yawns and begins to settle into resolute quietness in only the wise way nature knows how. Wispy tendrils of wood smoke from chimneys will soon lazily curl to the sky in silent homage bringing a nostalgic fragrance of nature’s own incense. Time slows, even creeps, subtly unraveling like an infinite spool of thread encouraging us to mimic it with our own slowing and rest-hungry bodies. To observe nature is to be wise. The change of the seasons teaches us when it is timely to slough off which no longer serves us like Fall, retreat into hibernation for healing and grounding like Winter, be patiently and newly reborn like Spring, and to rejoice in full splendor radiating like the sun in Summer. Soon, fall will be over and winter will come in her ethereal grace bathing the land in frozen gifts from the heavens. Ice crystals will fall like trillions upon trillions of tiny shimmering diamonds coating the undulating ground in velvety, blinding white softness. From time to time, the snow will come heavily, muffling all sounds, and creating a thick gray opaqueness to the sky as it shelters the land in its own protective cocoon. I look forward to it as if I were a child again. It opens my eyes as well as my heart to the ever-evolving and ever-present beauty that endlessly surrounds us. There is no better wonder than nature and there is no better nature than the San Luis Valley. – Angela Haynie