A layer of ice coated branches when this picture was taken last Friday night during a walk through Cobden. To tell you the truth, it would have made a lot more sense to have stayed inside, where it was warm.The ice was much heavier in the Alto Pass area than what we had seen in other parts of Union County. This picture was taken Saturday morning in downtown Alto Pass.How now, cold cow? Speaking of cliches... This critter was wondering why the photographer didn't just keep moving along during a visit to the Casper Church Road area between Anna and Cobden last Friday morning.

Please read this...Pictures, words don't do justice to what we saw

Good writers are supposed to avoid the use of cliches. I suppose the key words in that observation would be "good" and "supposed."

You've probably noticed that this writer uses the cliche that "a picture is worth a thousand words" fairly often. More often than ought to be done, quite honestly. Which is why I'm going to use the phrase again this week.

The pictures which accompany this week's colyum were taken during various journeys through Union County land last Friday and Saturday, when our neck of the woods experienced a bit of a winter ice storm. Fortunately, we did not have the kind of ice that some folks in other areas had the misfortune of dealing with.

Last Friday, your intrepid photographer and frequent user of cliches motored, and walked, around in the metropolitan and suburban Anna and Cobden areas in an effort to find some fascinating images of ice. Some of the pics were taken during the daylight hours, some at night. 

("Daylight," these days, has been somewhat of a relative sort of word. We've certainly had our day times, but sunlight has been a really scarce commodity.)

On Saturday, The Other Half and yours truly decided to motor to Carbondale, by way of Alto Pass, which, as you might guess, is not the most direct way to make the trip.

Turned out that our little adventure gave us a chance to see some rather spectacular, ice-covered landscape in Alto Pass and the surrounding area. I just wish the sun would have been shining, at least a little bit. I'm guessing the image would have been even more spectacular.

While we were wandering through the countryside, I kept seeing sights which looked like they would make for a good picture. The Other Half seemed to think the situation would have been much better, and perhaps even more enjoyable, if the person driving the car (that would have been me) would have actually paid attention to the road. I did. Pretty much.

Besides, if people can drive around yakking on their cell phones without paying even a little bit of attention to the world around them, can't I shoot some pictures while I'm behind the wheel? I'm just sayin'...

The goal of getting some halfway decent pictures of the ice was achieved. Sort of. For one thing, the pictures did not do justice to the images which we were seeing. From the Cliff View Park in Alto Pass, we could see the entire landscape below coated in ice. Pictures didn't do justice to what we were seeing, and I'm not sure that words are adequate, either. 

And, to tell you the truth, getting a good picture of ice is, well, not the easiest thing to do when the adventure involves newspapers. Newsprint simply does not seem to allow for the quality of images that you will see in a publication which is printed on glossy paper, like National Geographic. The images also look better when they are posted online.

Like I said, the goal of getting some images of the ice was achieved. Are they any good? I'll let you be the judge. Stay warm.

The Gazette-Democrat

112 Lafayette St.
Anna, Illinois 62906
Office Number: (618) 833-2158
Email: news@annanews.com

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