Redwood Grove, Morning Light – Muir Woods. Muir Woods National Monument, Golden Gate National Recreation Area, California. April 17, 2010. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.
Morning light slants though the trunks of tall redwood trees near Bohemian Grove, Muir Woods National Monument, California.
I was surprised by somewhat sunny conditions on this mid-April visit to Muir Woods National Monument north of San Francisco, California. When I left my home in the South Bay very early in the morning it was quite cloudy, and the forecast was for even cloudier (and more persistently cloudy) conditions north of the Golden Gate Bridge. But as I drove through the City the clouds cleared to the north and by the time I was across the Golden Gate it was almost clear, with just a bit of nice high cloudiness to diffuse the light a bit.
I arrived at Muir Woods early enough that I got a parking spot in the closest lot. (Those who visit the place often and who are familiar with the crush of tourists later in the day understand what this means… ;-) As I usually do, I wanders slowly up the trail alongside Redwood Creek, taking in as much of the scene (visual, auditory, olfactory, etc.) as I looked for photographs. Eventually I made it to the bridge (Bridge #2) that crosses the creek just above the old Bohemian Grove. This is a spot where I often photograph if the crowds aren’t too bad – there is a lot to see right here! There are some deciduous trees whose leaves can catch the filtered light in interesting ways; the creek flows through, in places with ferns right down to the waterline; and there are lots of very tall redwood trees. I’ve been working on some photographs in landscape orientation that show groups for the trees, focusing primarily on their massive and parallel trunks – in fact, one from the series on this visit consists of a stitch of something like five horizontal frames. This one is more conventional and is a single exposure.
This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.
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Technical Data:
Canon EOS 5D Mark II
Canon EF 70-200mm f/4 L USM at 200mm
ISO 200, f/16, .6 second
keywords: redwood, tree, grove, trunk, foreset, bohemian, muir, woods, national, monument, golden gate, recreation, area, trail, sequoia, sempervirens, tall, big, flora, foliage, nature, scenic, travel, san francisco, marin, county, california, usa, north america, morning, light, slant, stock
I’ve been through all of those parks and others, and I’m very familiar with Big Basin. One of the things I enjoy about Muir Woods is the combination of the trees and the very moist valley – I feel like there is more lush vegetation at Muir Woods than in some of the other parks. I could probably afford to look harder at, for example, Big Basin – but I don’t recall seeing the same carpets of Oregon Oxalis (redwood sorrel) there. The climate does get drier as you go south of San Francisco.
Dan
Dan-
This is a nice photo of the redwoods. Even though the background foliage is in bright light, and normally creates contrast issues, it doesn’t affect this image, and it works quite well. I like the vivid red hues of the massive trunks against the brilliant green background.
Here’s a question for you. Muir Woods is a beautiful place to be and to photograph (as we’ve seen over the years from your posted images), however aren’t there some great redwood locations closer to the South Bay?
Big Basin, Nicene Marks, Butano, et al? Are these locations any good for redwood forest images? Or is Muir Woods better? I ask this because living at the northern end of the bay, I’ve always heard some nice comments over the years on the redwoods of the South Bay/Santa Cruz regions and wondered how the two regions compare.