Gullies, Hills, and Mountains. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.
A line of badlands terrain full of gullies with desert mountains in the distance.
This photograph embodies many elements that attract me to Death Valley National Park. I’m always impressed by the clarity (and seeming irony) with which the place reveals the effect of water on the landscape. Essentially everything in this scene is the result of water, from the gullies on the soft foreground formations, to the gigantic, gravel-filled wash beyond, and the the eroded mountains in the distance. That distance is another important feature — I’ve only encountered the immense scale of this landscape in a few other places.
It was still morning when I made this photograph, though golden hour had passed. We had photographed more intimate aspects of the landscape in the earlier light, and now we were moving on when we paused at this high point to take in this gigantic scene. Beyond the foreground hills, the flat wash stretches for miles to the base of haze-obscured desert mountains.
G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.
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