Category Archives: Photographs: Yosemite

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Swirling Clouds, Winter

June 12, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Winter evening clouds swirl around Yosemite Valley

I have had this photograph sitting here for a few months now, and I just “rediscovered” it while skimming through a collection of photographs from earlier this year. This was not a year with much of a winter in California and the Sierra, but during a brief window late in the season we did get some weather that felt seasonal. We were in Yosemite Valley near the beginning of March and had some time to wander around. I love winter fog in The Valley, so we were unable to resist going and photographing it.

The photograph is, of course, from the famous and iconic Tunnel View overlook. As I recall it now, a few months later, we had made a more or less snap decision in the evening about where to go, and when we saw the conditions that could bring the common winter Valley fog we headed up to this obvious location. When this fog drifts in the Valley it can be almost endlessly entertaining… if you are into such things, and I am. The fog can appear spontaneously as the temperature of the damp air drops. Or clouds may begin to drift up the valley and through the trees. Or perhaps a giant fog cloud sort of sloshes back and forth across the Valley in slow motion, occasionally seeming to rise up along the sides of the cliffs and peaks. At one point on this evening the fog quickly moved in our direction, and instead of looking off through the clear air to see it in the distance, within moments it silently came over us and hid the view of the Valley.

Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Cascade, Boulders

June 1, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A seasonal waterfall cascades past granite boulders, Yosemite National Park

I guess I’ll go ahead and make this a “waterfall weekend” by posting a second photograph of the same little cascading creek that was featured in yesterday’s photograph. This small beauty is a seasonal cascade that is right next to the roadway—I’m definitely not taking any “wilderness photography” credit for this one. (Though the character if the creek is very similar to and remiss me of many such rocky creeks found in less accessible locations.) As is the case with some many such small creeks, this one comes and goes quickly in most years. It does not necessarily dry up completely, but it often diminishes to an unimpressive trickle later on.

Although the accessible location makes photographing this fall easy, there are still a few challenges. Perhaps the most mundane is that, given that one is photographing from the shoulder of a highway, you have to watch out for passing vehicles! From a photographic perspective there are a few more interesting challenges. One is that of composition. This section of the waterfall is some distance above the camera position, and there are only a few clean shots of it. I wanted some of the curving and flowing shapes at the top along with the faster moving, and hence narrower, section at the bottom, and I wanted to include the blocky, wet, and reflective rocks. The light is a bit tricky here, too. Fortunately, the cascade remains in shadow well after sunrise, but the best light seems to come at just about the moment when the sun starts to rise above the ridge behind the fall. Consequently, though it isn’t visible in this tightly cropped composition, I was shooting almost straight into the sun!

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Granite, Falling Water

May 31, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A spring creek cascades across dark fractured granite, Yosemite National Park

Yosemite’s Tioga Pass Road (Highway 120), which passes through the park and across the Sierra crest at Tioga Pass, opened earlier than usual this year. It was not the earliest recorded opening, but the very small snow pack of the winter season meant that in early May it looked much more like a typical June. There was some snow left on the ground, but rather than being the deep and compacted remains of months of winter snow it was mostly what was left from a single spring storm a few days earlier.

In a more typical year, a drive over this route on the opening weekend provides an experience that is, to my way of thinking, mostly about water. Not only do we get to see vast remaining snow banks holding water that will irrigate the Sierra for months to come, but the spring melt brings wild, watery scenes nearly everywhere. Waterfalls and creeks appear in places where there is almost no evidence of their existence weeks or months later. Creeks spill across the highway flood sections of it. Larger creeks and rivers overflow their banks and turn meadows into lakes. But not this year. The photograph features a small section of a larger cascade which bounces down a steep and rugged section of granite boulders. Beautiful as it is, it should look like this in late June rather than early May.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Spring Flooding, Tuolumne Meadows

May 12, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The Tuolumne River overflows its banks on a spring evening, Tuolumne Meadows

This is another, slightly different view of a scene that I shared recently, photographed at Tuolumne Meadows on the weekend when Tioga Pass Road over the Sierra crest opened for the 2014 season. As is my habit, I broke free and made it up there to celebrate the beginning of a new high country season. It was a quick trip—a 21 hour 550 mile drive that took me across the range to the Mono Lake area and some nearby sights on the “east side.” Later in the day I reversed course and headed back up to Tioga Pass and began my homeward trip, stopping to spend a good part of the evening in Tuolumne Meadows, where strong wind blew as the golden hour light began to develop.

This scene is full of things that I know well. I have visited the general area of Tuolumne Meadows since I was a child and my father took me and one of my brothers up there on the first camping trip that I can remember. Every spring (or early summer in wet years) when I return I look for this area of the meadow where the Tuolumne River overflows its banks and produces a temporary lake, even in a very dry year like this one. On a number of occasions I have hiked on a trail that crosses from right to left just below the bright granite peak in the upper left, heading for a pass below Ragged Peak and then on to Young Lakes, which lie just beyond that highest ridge. (Just below and to the left of the granite peak lies a beautiful area of subalpine meadow with scattered rocks and extensive fields of lupine.) On this evening there were few people in the meadow, as the campground was not yet open and not many people were still up here so late in the day, so I was able to wait quietly for the clouds and the light to line up just right.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Category Archives: Photographs: Yosemite

Swirling Clouds, Winter

Cascade, Boulders

Granite, Falling Water

Spring Flooding, Tuolumne Meadows

Photographer and visual opportunist. Daily photos since 2005, plus articles, reviews, news, and ideas.