A marmot emerges from rocks near Olmsted Point in Yosemite National Park, California.
I’m going for two in a row of the furry animal shots. This marmot is among those who live in the rocks at Olmsted Point, the iconic roadside viewpoint just before Tenaya Lake along the Tioga Pass Road. I may have had my very first “marmot experience” at this very spot many years ago when my father took me and my brother camping at Tuolumne Meadows. After many intervening decades of real back-country travel, I might be a bit jaded about roadside marmots… but it was a kick to have a chance to photograph this marmot and its partner as they ducked in and out of the rocks below the parking lot.
This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.
A marmot emerges from winter conditions along the Tioga Pass Road, Yosemite National Park, California.
Sometimes this is just a bit too easy. Almost anyone who has driven over Tioga Pass Road through the high country of Yosemite National Park has stopped at the famous overlook at Olmsted Point. From here you can look one direction and see the “back side” of Half Dome or look the other way and see Tenaya Lake and the procession of domes, ridges, and peaks beyond. But you can also see marmots up close. They hang out in the rocks right below the parking area and are less fearful of people than are normal high-country marmots. (I’m more familiar with the latter. Getting a good photograph of them is possible but very challenging.)
I stopped here on my drive over the pass on the first day it was open this year, and two marmots were active near where steps lead down toward a nearby dome. I simply sat down near by, kept very still, and then waited for them to appear where I could photograph them. They were very cooperative – and there will be more photographs of these “guys” to come.
This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.
Late afternoon shadows fall across the frozen surface of Tioga Lake with Tioga Pass and the snow-covered peaks of Kuna Crest beyond.
On June 5 I made my first “summer season” visit to the Sierra of the year. Usually I mark the start of the post-winter part of the year by heading to Yosemite Valley to experience the waterfalls close up during the peak flow of the meltwater-filled rivers. This year I had time for a one-day trip and I did, indeed, start in the Valley. The waterfalls are close to as big as they get right now, and the Merced River is close to reaching flood stage, with large meadow areas of the Valley already under water. (The latter is actually a normal condition at the peak of the runoff cycle.) However, after shooting in the Valley into mid-morning, I decided to head elsewhere because the crowds were oppressive and because tran-Sierra Tioga Pass Road had opened this very morning.
I’ve been over Tioga Pass Road before on or close to the first day that the route is open, but I haven’t seen conditions like these up there since the mid-1990s. (In 1996, IIRC, the pass didn’t open until July 1 after a very heavy and late winter.) There was still snow almost everywhere along the road. It would be possible to ski or snow-shoe in many areas and, in fact, there were people engaged in just those activities. Melting water was everywhere. In places where I have never seen water before there were roaring creeks, often pouring down next to or even onto the roadway. All lakes and ponds are nearly or completely frozen still. Tuolumne Meadows itself is still completely covered by snow… except where the flooding Tuolumne River has created a giant, fast-moving lake.
I made this photograph at Tioga Lake late in the afternoon after making a traditional visit to the “Who Nellie Deli” in Lee Vining for the ritual fish tacos. Long shadows from nearby peaks and clouds fall across the frozen surface of the lake, the saddle of Tioga Pass is beyond, and in the farthest distance it is still winter on the peaks of Kuna Crest.
This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.
Morning sun backlights receding eroded ridges and boulder in the coastal mountains of California’s Big Sur coast.
I now am not quite certain where this exact spot was… but somewhere along the Big Sur coast in the area of Garrapata State Park – there is a pretty good chance that it is just a bit north of Rocky Creek bridge and just south of the actually Rock Creek. (Where there is a restaurant which has, or so I hear, a wonderful view and very high prices.) As I probably mentioned in photos I posted earlier from this May 1 shoot, one subject that I was pursuing was the morning light from the sun as it just barely topped the high and steep mountains along the coast highway. This creates at least two interesting conditions, and both are present in this photograph: diffused and hazy light as the sun shine though very thin fog rising up the canyons from the ocean, and thin lines of light along the tops of ridges and peaks.
This photograph is 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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Photographer and visual opportunist. Daily photos since 2005, plus articles, reviews, news, and ideas.
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