Tag Archives: brush

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

Eastern Sierra Nevada Near June Lake

August 16, 2011 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Trees ascend sage-covered hills toward the Sierra Nevada crest near June Lake, California.

Near highway 395 in Mono County, the main north-south route east of the Sierra crest, these open stands of large conifers ascend from the high desert sagebrush country towards the peaks of the Sierra crest, which rise much more abruptly on this side of the range than on the gentle west side. The tall ridge is above the June Lakes resort area between Mammoth Lakes and Lee Vining.

While my primary goal on this trip was to photograph in the Yosemite high country along Tioga Pass Road, smoke from a wildfire near Glacier Point in the park was drifting over the Tuolumne area and creating a lot of very non-photogenic haze. I had a hunch that by dropped over to the east side of the range I might be able to get away from the smoke or at least find areas where it wasn’t so thick. The smoke was still affecting the light near Lee Vining, but I didn’t have to drive too far south to get out of its path, though even here there is a bit of haze increasing the effect of atmospheric recession.

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.

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

Forest Meets Meadow, Yosemite

July 31, 2011 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

A small sunlit meadow filled with shooting star flowers meets the edge of a dense lodgepole pine forest, Yosemite National Park.

For some reason many of the photographs I made on my recent trip to the Yosemite high country seemed to focus on the trees and the forests, and perhaps a bit less on the rocky peaks and prominences of the park. This photograph was made in a place that is not “special” in the ways that specialness is often measured in this park. As far as I know, it has no name, though it is not too far from Olmsted Point. It is simply a little area like so many others in this part of the Sierra, but one that I feel a connection to now that I have revisited it on several occasions and gradually pushed out the boundaries of my familiarity with it.

I first stopped near this spot along Tioga Pass Road several autumns ago on an evening when fog blanketed the nearby ridges. Very close to this spot there was a break in the fog, and I could see the sunset light and its effect on the fog clouds, so I pulled over and made some photographs. A year or so later, now having an actual awareness that there was a pull-out at this spot in the road, I stopped again on a summer morning for no particular reason and saw that a faint trail headed off into the lodgepole forest that was mixed with glacial boulders. I walked a short distance out on this path and found a small pond that I photographed, and I filed the location away as one to investigate again later.

On this July’s visit, I put this spot on my agenda and made a plan to visit it early on morning after photographing first light on a nearby ridge. Because there is no single attention-grabbing icon at this spot, rather than leaving my car with a target in mind I wandered slowly into this forest and simply kept my eyes open. (And I tried not to think about the mosquitos that are always thick in the lodgepole forest at this time of year!) First I stopped at the pond that I had previously photographed; then I picked up that trail and followed it through the forest, past other ponds, and across some glaciated granite near the edge of this small meadow filled with shooting star flowers, with the light coming through the forest beyond.

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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Alpenglow, Trees, and Granite

July 22, 2011 G Dan Mitchell 9 Comments

This is one of my favorite locations in the Yosemite back-country and, in fact, in the entire Sierra Nevada range. This beautiful sub-alpine basis contains three lovely lakes and is surrounded by varied terrain that includes distant views, peaks and ridges towering above, lodgepole pine forests, meadows small and large, and an open view to the west that often provides stunning light late in the day.

As is usually the case, I was camped at the of the three lakes – this time for several days of photography – and I had headed to the upper lake late in the day to do some evening photography. I have photographed there quite a few times, but I still haven’t come close to exhausting the photographic potential of the place. On this evening I knew that I wanted to be ready to photograph the golden hour light, but I was also interested in the smaller groups of trees that grow among the granite boulders and I wanted to see what might develop as alpenglow struck the glacial slopes above the lake.

There is a small, fun twist to the story of this visit. I took a semi-cross-country route to the upper lake from my camp at the lower lake, and because I knew that I’d be returning alone in deep twilight or after dark, on the hike up I was concentrating intensely on fixing a series of landmarks in my mind for the return hike. I was so single-minded about this that I made it all the way to the lake and my first intended subject (a small shoreline tree) without looking around much. It was only a moment after arriving that I got out of focus-on-the-route mode and looked around. I had walked right past the campsite of a couple of photographers without even seeing them, much less saying “hi.” Turns out that the photographers were John Sexton and Anne Larsen. After exchanging greetings and conversation, I went about my business of shooting along the edge of the lake. (If I recall correctly, John was shooting nearby as I made this exposure.)

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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” (Heyday Books) is available directly from him. Blog | Bluesky | Mastodon | Substack Notes | Flickr | Email

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

Mammoth Peak and Kuna Crest, Overflowing Tuolumne River

July 1, 2011 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Mammoth Peak and the Kuna Crest loom above as the Tuolumne River overflows its banks and floods surrounding meadows on a frosty spring morning, Yosemite National Park.

As I drove from Lee Vining Canyon over Tioga Pass and toward the Tenaya Lake area early in the morning, I came to the Tuolumne River where it passes under the bridge beneath the highway in the Tuolumne Meadows area. Just at about this moment the sun was rising high enough to begin to warm the frost covered meadow, at least the parts of it that were not flooded by the high water of the Tuolumne. Overnight it had risen almost to the level of the bridge and was so high that after passing under the bridge a small portion split off and headed into the trees to the right of the main branch. In a few weeks this flooded area and its reflecting surface will be gone, and there will just be a meadow and people will hike though it.

The backlight comes across the shoulder of Mammoth Peak, the high point near the end of the long snow-covered ridge of Kuna Crest, which runs parallel to Lyell Canyon toward Donohue Pass and the Sierra Crest.

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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.

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