The Voyagers

 An early summer evening's walk to Lakeside.

 This was during the last days of the heatwave, so we were strolling at a leisurely pace...the kind of pace you use to avoid working up too much of a sweat.

 We were just at the turning point of the evening - when the heat is just thinking about letting up.

 But still, one has to be careful not to exert too much energy, or to exert it only in small, manageable bursts...

 until the sun lowers itself on its ponderous way just a bit closer to the horizon.

 Here on the Front Range, you have the purple, multi-layered proscenium of the Rocky Mountains as a bit of a buffer. When the sun hits the razor's edge of those jagged peaks, relief is yours.

 Still, summer evenings are long and slow, and on a torpid day like this, the heat seems to cling.

 On this day, we were concerned that the heat of the day would cling to the cement walkways of the amusement park once we got there, turning it into a convection oven. So we walked slowly. We paused in the dappled shade cast by the giant cottonwoods of our neighborhood. We picked clover, and dawdled.

But in the end, our worry was unfounded. The heat let up just as we approached the gates of the old, rickety park, and inside the evening turned cool and magical.