Wickenburg, Arizona.
It’s less than an hour’s drive to Wickenburg from our home in Buckeye via the main highway, but when we head to this “cowboy town” northwest of Phoenix, we take the long way through the desert, and past the Vulture Mine via a beautiful winding road.
Wickenburg is an interesting community that was once the third largest town in Arizona. Today, the population is under 7,000, but during the winter, there are plenty of visitors. We enjoy arriving just before lunch and eating at one of the local restaurants. We usually choose either Anita’s Cocina or Nana’s Sandwich Shoppe.
Then we walk around town enjoying the day. One of the places people visit to have their picture taken is at the Jail Tree where a sculpture of a prisoner puts a graphic touch on the nearby tree. The large sign next to the tree reads, “THE JAIL TREE From 1863 to 1890 outlaws were chained to this tree for lack of a hoosegow. Escapes were unknown.”
About the photo. Captured with my Samsung S20U, I wanted the entire tree, the sign, and the prisoner in the shot. To make that happen, I took two images, one of the lower part of the tree, the sign and prisoner. Then I took another photo of the top section of the tree. I used Lightroom to merge the two images into a (mostly) square image. I used the 108 Megapixel mode for the images creating a single panoramic image about 11,000 pixels square. From there, I put it in Luminar AI for finishing touches, and exported it as a 2K HD image. You can get a high definition view of the image by clicking on it to view it in my Flickr album.
I could have included this post as an entry in the Squares photo challenge here but I write these posts in advance so that I don’t have to write as much while I am traveling. By the time you read this, the Square Trees theme will have changed to the next quarter’s theme.
I encourage fellow bloggers to create their own Cellpic Sunday posts. I never have a specific topic for this feature, and the only rules are that the photo must be captured with a cell phone, iPad, or another mobile device… If you have an image from a drone, that’s acceptable as well. The second rule is to link your challenge response to this post or leave a comment here with a link to your post in the comment.
John Steiner
Flare Legend Adventures
Excellent capture!
Escapes were unknown! Who would want to leave that shade? 😃
You bet. That tree is life in the desert. >grin<
I think I have been there, on one of my visits to Phoenix to visit an aunt and uncle. Did one of their restaurants used to have a huge buffet?
I am not aware of a large buffet restaurant, but that certainly could have been before I first traveled to Wickenburg. I’ve only been to two, Nana’s Sandwich Shop and Anita’s Cocina. There are many more restaurants there, now.
I had not figured out the trick between the two parts of the picture, it’s well done!
Thank you!
This is a fun post, John. I always learn something, not just about photography but about places to go from your posts. 🙂 We haven’t been to Wickenburg yet. There’s a very windy way to get there from Prescott, but we got about half-way last winter, and turned around before it got dark and we were stuck.
We traveled to Wickenburg from Jerome once. It was a beautiful drive, but we started late in the day and though we were planning on dinner at Wickenburg, by the time we got there, every place we wanted to eat was closed.
I suspect your drive was on the same highway.
It sounds like you were coming from the opposite direction. We started at Prescott and didn’t make it to Wickenburg or Jerome. I drove all the way from Sedona through Jerome to Prescott once. – Never again. I was feeling pretty edgy – literally on the edge- by the time we got to Prescott. 🙂
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Cool jail tree, John. Another small Arizona town I have yet to explore! I linked my post to your feature today.https://secondwindleisure.com/2021/08/08/sunday-stills-song-lyric-photo-challenge-summers-of-my-dreams/
When you get to Wickenburg, go south on a winding highway to the Vulture Mine. It’s worth the side trip to visit the restored and original mining site.
Thanks for introudcing the Jail Treewhere and the sculpture of a prisoner! Great capture, John.
It turns out that a lot of photos that I’ve taken recently on a cell phone are of food. So here’s another.