Tag Archives: lake

Photographs: Mono Lake Basin, Photographs: Nature

Evening Storm Clouds, Mountains

August 3, 2017 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Evening thunderstorm clouds begin to break up above high desert mountains east of the Sierra Nevada at sunset

The Sierra Nevada, being more out of the path of the seasonal monsoonal flows that beset the Southwest, often experiences clear weather — sometimes too clear! Most photographers prefer a more interesting sky, and we can actually be heard complaining about too much nice weather at times. But periodically the atmospheric flows shift northward and westward a bit, and we do see thunderstorm weather in the Sierra. Most of us love this, and we look forward to “interesting skies” when it happens. The clouds often build up over the crest and they can then spread east or sometimes west as the day wears on. Mostly the clouds will clear out late in the day, but sometimes when they drift to the east of the range the electrical show may continue into the evening.

I experienced some of this “interesting weather” on my recent visit to the Sierra around the northeastern portion of Yosemite. It actually turned out to be more interesting than expected, when a forecast of clearing on day two of my trip morphed into a forecast to daily thunderstorm chances. On one afternoon I took a hike up an east side canyon, and on my return I was surprised to find that there was rain falling near the mouth of the canyon. Before long in rained and hailed on me, and these appeared to be the kinds of clouds that might stick around into the evening. I decided to forego dinner, instead finding a high overlook and photographing the cloud show right on through sunset and into the post-sunset blue hour.

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

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Early Season Alpine Terrain

August 1, 2017 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A lakeside meadow begins its short summer period of growth as snowpack melts along the Sierra Nevada crest

I think I can use this photograph to tell a story or two. In late July of this much wetter than normal year, I visited the Sierra in the area roughly between Tuolumne Meadows and Lundy Canyon over a period of four days. After five years of California drought, the balance tipped the opposite direction this past winter, and did so with a vengeance. Many areas got as much a twice the normal amount of precipitation this season. Many areas opened late, lots of facilities were damaged, and a number of places (such as Tuolumne Meadows campground) were still not open when I visited. But I managed to find a high elevation campsite just outside the park, and I decided to mix a little hiking with my photography.

This lake is perhaps a couple of miles from a trailhead that offers two relatively easy ways to get there. I took a familiar one along a north-facing slope above the shoreline of a big lake, because it is shorter than the alternative and in some ways easier. Or so I thought. It turned out that the snow from this big winter is still thick in areas above 10,000′ of elevation — like this one — and more than half of my little hike turned out to be on snow. There was also water everywhere — waterfalls and cascades visible high up on mountain slopes, streams dashing madly down below, flooded meadows, and more. My second challenge turned out to be this water — and I finally came up against a creek that I wasn’t willing to try crossing while hiking solo — a bit too dangerous. The lake in this photograph lies in a subalpine basin below peaks on the Sierra crest. The snow had just (for the most part) melted out of this sodden meadow near the lake’s outlet stream, so I decided to make a few photographs that included the large blocks of granite standing in the meadow along with the very tall alpine ridge in the background.

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

Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Mono Lake Basin, Photographs: Nature

From Tufa To Mountains, Dawn

July 30, 2017 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Predawn light above high desert mountains, reflecting on the surface of Mono Lake

Mono Lake is famed for several things, among them the remarkable tufa towers found in several locations along the shoreline of this great land-locked lake east of the Sierra Nevada. And, yes, this photograph includes a few of those towers — a small group that lies far enough from the shoreline to make them less accessible and interesting to most photographers. (No, that isn’t Nessie — or a band of Nessie lookalikes — at the lower left corner.)

But tufa towers are not my primary or strongest association with this place. Mine include more ephemeral things — the sense of huge space, the expanse of the sky (accentuated by the distance and smallness of surrounding mountains), the deep quiet that is broken only by the sounds of birds and wind. In my experience, to understand those things about this place you must find a quiet place away from other people and perhaps just “be” there quietly, long enough to let its stillness begin to affect you, too. On this morning I arrived in Mono Basin before dawn, ending up at a spot that is not typically regarded as being iconic. Being early, I was in no hurry, so I set up my camera and tripod and just looked for a while before beginning to make photographs of the predawn light from beyond the eastern mountains as it reflected on the breeze-ruffled surface of the lake.

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

Shoreline, First Morning Light

July 1, 2017 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

First morning light comes to the forested shoreline of a Sierra Nevada backcountry lake

Near the end of the summer of 2014 I ventured into the Yosemite backcountry with a group of friends and photographers for a week of landscape photography work, first at a somewhat isolated lake and then near a more popular location. Although I’ve been a backpacker for years, accustomed to slogging along with a big backpack carrying all of my own gear, on this trip we were supported by pack train. In fact, we had stupendous support. All of our non-photographic gear was packed in to the first location. A few days later a pack train returned and moved our gear to the next location. (Meanwhile we hiked a cross-country route to get there, following a trajectory that stock could not use.) And finally at the end of the trip the packers came back again and schlepped our gear back out to civilization. I think I could get used to this — though I still very much enjoy the quiet and slow pace of self-contained backpacking.

We were at the lake for three or four days, long enough go venture beyond the obvious things that one sees when first arriving at a place. We had time to return to subjects and reconsider them a few days later, possibly in different light or at a different time of day. We were also able to push out boundaries outward a bit from the lake itself, climbing a few of the nearby promontories. And, always, we had the luxury of rolling out of sleeping bags before dawn, walking a few steps to the lakeshore, and beginning the day’s work. This photograph was made not more than five minutes from camp as the first light began to work down to lake level.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: lake

Evening Storm Clouds, Mountains

Early Season Alpine Terrain

From Tufa To Mountains, Dawn

Shoreline, First Morning Light

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