Is it ever too early to start thinking about autumn? I don’t think so! Every fall I revisit familiar places to photograph the signs of the changing seasons. One of these is Yosemite Valley, where the most interesting colors often peak right around Halloween. At a minimum I make a long day trip up and back from the San Francisco Bay Area. But my preference is to visit for at least a coupe of days.
Continue reading Autumn Black Oak Leaves
You often hear the expression that there is a “carpet of wildflowers” in a landscape. That description was apt in quite a few areas of Death Valley National Park when we visited in late February. To be clear, much of the landscape of this desert park sill looked like… desert. But in places there were wildflower blooms of impressive size.
Continue reading Desert Gold Bloom
Looking at this aquatic scene it is hard to believe the normally here we would be looking at arid salt flats extending toward the horizon, not the reflective surface of a very large lake. But this is Death Valley, a place of astonishing variety, and sometimes that arid landscape is full of water.
Continue reading Desert Reflections, Lake Manly
I recall the first time that I became truly aware of the variety of patterns and texture found in the Sandstone faces of The Southwest. I was photographing deep in a canyon in the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument with friends when I got the idea to keep my eyes open for petroglyphs, something I had not previously thought much about. Before long, I started imagining petroglyphs everywhere. Eventually, realizing that was impossible, I figured out that the rocks and erosion processes themselves produce remarkable patterns.
Continue reading Stained Sandstone, Lichen