Tag Archives: grand staircase

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Arch and Shadows

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Arch and Shadows
“Arch and Shadows” — Utah red rock country arch in a shadowed canyon.

It might seem that improbable features like this are everywhere in Southern Utah. While some are familiar icons in national parks like Zion and Arches, similar features are found in less accessible locations. If you poke around enough you can experience them in relative quiet and solitude. I’ve wondered why it is this way in Utah, and I think there are several explanations: such features really are quite common, and some that warrant national park status are in non-park areas for reasons including uneasy compromises with extractive industries.

A group of us wandered into a lovely red rock canyon, inauspicious at the start but with sandstone walls that soon began to tower and close us off from the world beyond. These are intimate places, where your awareness is mostly confined to the space between the canyon bends in front of and behind you, and where the silence is only broken by occasional birdsong and the gentle sounds of water.

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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

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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Canyon Cottonwoods, Autumn

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Canyon Cottonwoods, Autumn
The sandstone walls of a Utah canyon tower above autumn cottonwood trees.

Canyon Cottonwoods, Autumn. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The sandstone walls of a Utah canyon tower above autumn cottonwood trees.

Back on this autumn day in 2012 three of us entered this lovely canyon and gradually worked our way down a few miles of its length, following its sinuous path around bends as it dug deeper into the red rock landscape of Southern Utah. I had spent close a month in Utah that season, and this was during the final few days of this period — and this “Sierra Guy” was starting to get a feel for this beautiful landscape.

These trees, in peak autumn color, stood at a bend in the canyon. This river canyon follows a classic meandering pattern, with short straight sections alternating with bends carved deeply into the sandstone terrain. In general the straight sections tend to be a bit more open while the bends tend to be places of deeper shade. This spot was definitely in the latter category, and the reflected soft light saturated the warm tones of the autumn colors.

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 and Amazon.

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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Canyon Cottonwood Trees

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Canyon Cottonwood Trees
Cottonwood trees with autumn leaves in a Utah canyon.

Canyon Cottonwood Trees. © Copyright 2020 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

© Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

I came across this pair of cottonwood trees while walking up a lovely, narrow canyon in Southern Utah some years back. It is the same canyon I’ve mentioned in previous posts — the one where I had my very first introduction to the joys of exploring red rock canyons. I was here on this occasion with a couple of photographer friends.

There are, of course, quite a few cottonwood trees in Utah. (To say the least!) Why these two? I was impressed by just how different they were, despite growing in virtually the same spot and in the same conditions. Part of this can be explained, no doubt, by a difference in their ages. But such trees are also profoundly affected by the happenstance of where they sprout — is the soil shallow or deep, does it flood, is it rocky? The tree on the left still retains quite a few green leaves, it no longer has any lower branches on its straight trunk. The tree on the right seems like a veritable teenager, with its yellow leaves and its less solid structure — though if you look close you can make out the shape of its future growth, too.

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 and Amazon.

Blog | About | Flickr | Facebook | Email

Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

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All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

The Last Leaves

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The Last Leaves
The last autumn leaves on trees and bushes above sculpted rocks along a bend in the Escalante River.

The Last Leaves. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The last autumn leaves on trees and bushes above sculpted rocks along a bend in the Escalante River.

Fall is my favorite season. I’m not really a summer person — too hot! — but the warm early autumn days are just about perfect. I love winter, too, and part of the appeal of fall is the certainty that winter, the time of “interesting” weather is coming soon, too. And as fall moves on toward winter the first of the Pacific cold weather systems begin to arrive, and snow begins to arrive in the Sierra.

Before that happens, though, we go through the autumn color season. In recent years I have discovered that I can stretch it out for months. For me it begins with a few early changes by the beginning of September in the Sierra which culminate a month later with the spectacular aspen color. Then the color works its way west across the range and down into the westside valleys, before it finally begins to peak in November nearer the coast. There’s still a bit left in December… and sometimes even later. I photographed this scene deep in the canyon of the Escalante River along a rocky bend where the final colors of the season were just about spent.

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 and Amazon.

Blog | About | Flickr | Facebook | Email

Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

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All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.