The Foxy Mouse, World Wide Pinhole Day and Los Cerrillos

Worldwide Pinhole day began as a soggy, sweater weather hugging kind of day.

Chilly, damp air and a very shy sun made the morning doubtful so I made a few digital pinhole shots with a Wanderlust pinhole cap on my Lumix GF1. Yeah, I know digital pinhole is considered by some to be impure, but a gal's gotta do something when the weather frowns rain on your head.

After making a few digi pinhole pix, the weather seemed to be improving so my husband and I drove up Hwy 14, also known as The Turquoise Trail, and headed for Los Cerrillos.

Los Cerrillos is one of my favorite spots along this road and is listed as a ghost town on some online sites. It is far from being a ghost, but has the markings of a former fast times boom area during its heyday as a bustling get rich quick mining town.
It was founded in 1879 but has a history older than the little hills it is named for.

Signs of former businesses still greet the curious traveler with a few shops offering goods for sale.

Our first stop was the Catholic Cemetery. It is out of town about 2 miles and well worth a visit.
It looks like a cemetery right out of an old western movie, complete with cacti, rocks and wild rabbits. It's perched on one of the little hills so the view is nice and peaceful. Many names on the headstones remembered people that settled the area and whose ancestors still live here.

The photos below were made with a Holga Wide pinhole camera on old film and developed in coffee.

The next photo is of The Casa Grande Trading Post in Los Cerrillos.
It wasn't open today, but I've been inside in the past and it's a wonderland of old mining stuff, rocky rocks, curious curios and lots of things that I'm sure some people just couldn't live without. They also have an enormous collection of vintage bottles...of which I'm quite enamored.

This photo was made with my newly made "Foxy Mouse" mentioned in yesterday's post. It's made with Harman Direct Positive paper, so it created the print you see me holding without any contact printing or hocus pocus. What you see is exactly what came out of the developer.

I get all gushy when I pull one of these out of the developer! Developing negatives gives me a buzz too, but pulling a fresh print is beyond cool!

P.S.
Here's another little pinhole of the trading post made with a little Ghirardelli chocolate tin with a paper negative sloshed in caffenol.

I like how this little pinhole camera distorts the landscape.  This shot was made the same distance as the one from the "Foxy Mouse".  Fun stuff!