Posts tagged ‘Snow’

Feb 28

Creativity vs. Snow and Ice

Perhaps you heard that in mid-February, Texas suffered a devastating winter storm, which overwhelmed the power and water infrastructure.

(Click on any image to see a higher resolution version.)

It started with an ice storm on February 11. These are relatively uncommon in Central Texas, so when they happen, they tend to wreak havoc. This storm brought more ice than usual. The weight of the ice on trees and power lines led to several power outages around the city.

We lost power for 31 hours, beginning Thursday afternoon, February 11. Once power came back on Friday night, it pretty much stayed on for us through the rest of the storm. We were among the lucky ones; we had friends who went for several days without power or water or both.

To round out the week, we had a frozen water heater for a couple of days, and then went through five days of a boil water notice in Austin. Oh, and don’t forget about the pandemic.

Dec 1

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Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge

Bosque del Apache, a wildlife refuge in south central New Mexico, is one of the premiere locations for bird photography in the United States. It’s a wintering spot for thousands of sandhill cranes and snow geese (and dozens of other species of birds). Its 57,000 acres straddle I-25, the Rio Grande, and El Camino Real.

I first came here in 2005—with a 35mm film camera, a few rolls of film, and with an 80-200mm f/2.8 as my longest lens. I came back with a digital camera and better lenses every year for awhile. After a few years, I got burned out and stopped coming. It was getting more crowded, and I felt like the refuge was being managed in a way that made the photography harder.

I’d been wanting to come back; I’d heard reports that the refuge was in better shape for photography. I had a window of time right before Thanksgiving where I could drive to Socorro, spend a couple of days photographing, and then drive back. It’s a long drive, but driving let me bring more gear than I would been comfortable flying with.

Here’s my gear list:

May 28

Yellowstone National Park

On Wednesday, I planned to get up early for sunrise photography, and to start driving up to Yellowstone. But I woke to rain in Jackson, and slept in another hour.

I drove up through Grand Teton National Park and the John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Memorial Parkway and entered Yellowstone National Park at the south entrance. I continued north, and rain turned into snow. It was 34 degrees and the roads warm enough to not have trouble with ice.

Click on any image to enlarge.

I tried to be a tourist and visit a roadside sight or two. Here’s Lewis Falls, with me standing on snow, watching the snow fall. Did I mention it was 34 degrees?

Soon, I decided it was best to just keep driving on to Old Faithful. By the time I got there, the snow had subsided, and there was just a little bit of rain. I arrived a few minutes before the famous geyser erupted. Not the photo I imagined with a brilliantly colorful sky in the background, but this is more of a snapshot anyway. In the peak of summer (and in better weather), you would see thousands more people surrounding Old Faithful.

Peak season begins Memorial Day weekend, and I was there just before that. So it was beginning to get crowded, but nothing like the park sees later on. Being a week or two before the busy season begins also means that not every road (or campground or lodge) is open—but it’s still a great time to visit. The creeks, rivers, and waterfalls were really flowing.

Here’s the inside of the historic Old Faithful Inn, with people waiting to enter the dining room. Some consider the inn the largest log building in the world.

I walked around for awhile in the rain in the Upper Geyser Basin in the Old Faithful area. It was nice to get out and walk around. Here’s one of the pools in the area: Morning Glory Pool. Pro tip: bring your polarizing filter to cut down on reflections in the water. I left mine at home.

My destination for the night was Canyon Lodge, so I kept on driving north (no more falling snow!), past the other other geyser basins. Here’s an overlook showing the Norris Geyser Basin in the distance.

May 27

More Time in the Grand Tetons

I’m back in Austin now. I chose not to keep up with the blog as I went. A combination of 16+ hours of light for photography each day, lots of travel time, time with friends, and a little bit of allergies all conspired to help me choose sleep instead of half-hearted writing into the night. But I’m back, and have four more blog posts in the works after this one.

Sunrise each morning was about 5:50 AM, so I’d get up every morning about 5:00 and head out to see what the sunrise would bring. We never had any truly spectacular colors in the morning, but it was still beautiful to be in this amazing place to see how the sun would first light the mountains.

Click on any image to enlarge.

Balsam Root, the yellow flower in the foreground of the photo below, was blooming in many places in the valley.

Some mornings would start with fog in low-lying areas. Clouds in the mountains were constantly changing. This infrared photo is from the same day as those in my earlier blog post about the Snake River Overlook. It was taken about fifteen or twenty minutes before the images I posted last week.

I dropped by another couple of famous places for photography.

Oxbow Bend, below Jackson Lake on the Snake River often has still water in the mornings, great for reflections of Mount Moran, and to its left, the mountain known, at least for now, as Mount Woodring. (And further left are Mount St. John and Rockchuck Peak.)

Mormon Row is a section of Grand Teton National Park that I suspect most people don’t visit, but is famous among photographers. A group of Mormons from Idaho homesteaded here beginning in the late 1800’s, and lived here through the mid-1900’s before being sold to the National Park Service.

Perhaps most famous is the Thomas Alma Moulton barn, shown below.

I didn’t do much hiking this trip, but I did take an easy five-mile hike on Tuesday up to Phelps Lake. This is where I saw the moose in my earlier blog post about Grand Teton Wildlife.

Here’s the GPS track for the hike. It’s part of the Laurance S. Rockefeller Preserve in the southernmost section of Grand Teton National Park. This section was donated by Laurance S. Rockefeller to the National Park Service in 2001.

May 20

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Snake River Overlook

Pro Tip: If you’re going to use your iPad for your alarm clock, confirm that it’s set to the right timezone, so that you don’t accidentally wake up at 4 AM when you were planning for 5 AM.

This morning’s forecast was for mostly clear skies, so I woke up early and headed into the park. I decided to start at the Snake River Overlook, made famous by Ansel Adams in his 1942 photo, The Tetons and the Snake River. The view’s not quite the same, because the trees have grown so much taller in the last 76 years.

I spent about an hour there, before and after sunrise, shooting a variety of compositions. Here are a couple of similar photos that I liked, one visible light, one infrared. The first is closer to sunrise, with the fog still lifting off the river. The infrared image is from a bit later, after the sun started to illuminate the foreground. Which one do you like better?

After I left the overlook, I headed down to Schwabacher’s Landing to take advantage of the reflections in the relatively still water.

I saw elk and geese today, and hoping I see more wildlife tomorrow.

May 19

Grand Teton National Park

I flew to Jackson, Wyoming, today. I’m here, in part, for a North American Nature Photography Association Nature Photography Celebration.

Today’s forecast called for an 80% chance of rain, but that can lead to some nice dramatic photos. I headed north into the Grand Teton National Park, stopping at the Moose Junction Visitor Center to find out about trail conditions during this early part of the season. I continued driving north, to get my bearings. It’s been over twenty years since I was last here.

The weather held out just fine. It was mostly cloudy, with intermittent rain showers that never lasted more than a few minutes. I think the weather will improve somewhat during my stay.

Here are a few images to give you a taste of what it was like today. Click on any of them to enlarge.

Grand Teton, Mount Owen, and Teewinot Mountain:

Mount Moran, in the clouds:

The first image was taken with a Fujifilm X-T2, with a Fujifilm 18-55 lens.

The second and third images were taken with a Nikon D300 and Nikkor 18-200 lens. Camera converted to infrared by LifePixel.

More coming up later this week.

Aug 21

Alaska, Days 6-10

I apologize for not posting in a few days. Our days have been full, and the internet less than speedy and reliable, so updating the blog took a back seat.

In Skagway, we took the White Pass and Yukon Route Railroad to White Pass, briefly crossing into Canada before returning to Skagway.

The next port of call was Sikta, where our good weather karma started to run out. Our last day at sea met swells up to 18 feet, and winds up to 50 knots, as a large storm passed from west to east, as we went through in the opposite direction. This same storm caused significant flooding in Sikta the day after we were there.

In the photo below from somewhere in the Gulf of Alaska, note the relationship between the horizon and the boat. Our motion sickness patches worked great, though.

One of the highlights of our trip so far was a stop at Happy Trails Kennels, home of Martin Buser, a four time Iditarod champion. We loved the excitement of the dogs, playing with some 10-week-old puppies, and sitting in Martin and Kathy’s home talking about dog training philosophy.

We next worked our way up to Talkeetna, where the good weather karma returned. Denali is only visible about 30% of the time. Many people come to Alaska and stay for days without seeing it. Here are a couple of photos from Wednesday evening and Thursday morning. These are from about 60 miles away.

Tomorrow, we will probably be off the air for a couple of days in the Denali Backcountry. More when we return.

Mar 14

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Kasha-Katuwe Tent Rocks National Monument

I recently enjoyed a great visit to Kasha-Katuwe Tent Rocks National Monument. It’s between Albuquerque and Santa Fe, New Mexico. This monument is famous for its rock formations, but I didn’t really know what to expect.

From the moment I drove up to the gate, I felt welcomed. “Thanks for coming here!”, said the ranger—I think because he was proud of this place.

I visited the day after a snowstorm came through. Perhaps because I grew up reading Arizona Highways, I think that snow in the desert is a beautiful thing.

Here are a couple of self-portraits, giving you an idea of the scale of the rock formations.

I’ll be back, I’m sure.

Dec 20

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Grand Canyon, South Rim

On Friday, I drove up to the south rim of the Grand Canyon, driving from east to west. There were a few inches of snow along the rim, but with a little care, I managed to get to some of the overlooks. Here’s an infrared shot from Grandview Point. (To see more detail in each image, click on them to enlarge.)

For sunset, I drove to Pima Point, which is along Hermit Road almost all the way to Hermit’s Rest. Here’s some of the last of the evening light falling on the Tower of Ra [see the comments].

Here’s another infrared photo. I think this does a good job of showing the variety of textures and layers in the rock.

Conservation Photography and Other Photo Adventures