More than meets the eye

Pat and I took a drive through the Garden of the Gods on Monday, sort of a detour while running errands. There were tons of people enjoying the park that day. It was a really nice afternoon! We parked the car and walked up one of the trails for a couple hundred yards -- Pat wanted me to capture all those gorgeous shadows on the rocks. As I took the above shot, I noticed that there was someone sitting atop one of them. I think the name of the big formation on the left is Gateway Rock (or maybe it's Cathedral Rock), and if you look really closely you'll see a man at its highest point. I zoomed in my lens so I could get a much closer view of him. A few minutes later, as we continued our drive through the park, I noticed that a friend had joined him, so we parked the car again and I took a picture of both of them. I don't know much about rock climbing, but I do know that safety gear is highly recommended to climb in the Garden of the Gods. The rocks there are almost 100% vertical. Inexperienced climbers (uh, tourists) get stranded all the time and we regularly hear about high angle rescues on the local news. Both of these guys were using safety gear, although the first guy seemed to be wearing jeans. It looked like they were really enjoying the view from up there. Great way to start the year!