Tag Archives: mountains

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

Spillway Lake

January 4, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Afternoon light on Spillway Lake in the Yosemite backcountry

Although it was a bit more than nine years ago, I remember this hike very well. I had a free afternoon, so I decided to hike out to a familiar Sierra Crest pass that I had visited before, but along the way I chose to take a detour up past the lake see in the photograph. This route followed a trail along a small, singing creek that topped out in a fairly level subalpine meadow that surrounded the lake, and the last bit of the hike was on open, smooth ground. I paused at the lake, stopping at some rocks on near the small peninsula visible near the lower part of the image to eat a snack, drink some water, and quietly take in the scene.

The trail to the lake ends here, but the route up across open terrain to a nearby pass was fairly obvious in this country, so I simply passed along the edge of the lake and then headed up toward the wide saddle. It wasn’t long before I arrived there, and after my visit to the pass I started back down along the trial that came to the pass from another nearby drainage. I traversed a high ridge and had a good clear view back down to “my” lake, now far below and luminous in the afternoon light and backed by the tall dark hill with talus slope above leading to a higher ridge.

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.

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

Utah Dawn Sky

December 24, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Cloudy sky at sunrise above the high country of Capitol Reef National Park

This photograph came from a particularly productive morning shoot near Capitol Reef National Park. We had decided to get up early and head down the east side of the park along a lengthy gravel road, with the eventual goal of either exploring a slot canyon or going up high on the ridge to the west of the water pocket fold valley. We drove east through the park in pre-dawn darkness, but as we left the park and started to head south the sun was just coming up. It soon became apparent that a special sunrise might be in store for us, so we quickly found a place with some broad views and stopped and got out.

The morning conditions were a bit unusual and quite special. To our west the sky was darkened by some slightly ominous looking clouds — the sort that seemed to have the potential for bringing rain later in the day. Far to the east there appeared to be enough breaks in the cloud cover to allow some dawn sunlight through, and we hoped that the foreground peaks of Capitol Reef might be lit against this darker sky. In fact, that is precisely what happened very soon after we arrived. I chose the vertical format for this photograph, minimizing the size of the brilliantly lit slopes ascending toward the peaks, so that I could emphasize the ominous quality of this dark sky.

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Boat, San Luis Reservoir

December 21, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Two fisherman in a very small boat on the very large surface of the San Luis Reservoir on a cloudy and hazy autumn day

Returning from my first Central Valley winter bird photography excursion of the new season, I passed by San Luis Reservoir in the middle of the day when soft clouds hung above the mountains across the water and the sun made the hazy atmosphere glow. I usually just drive right past this place — which isn’t easy to access, even though the road runs right next to it — but I decided to figure out how and where to stop and make some photographs.

I found a high overlook at the visitor center that stands at the north end of the huge earthen dam, and from here there was a panoramic view of the surface of the lake and the surrounding California hills, which are mostly golden at this point in the early winter season. (Before long, after the first real rains, they will turn “impossibly green.”) As I photographed landscape subjects I noticed one very small fishing boat on the otherwise-empty surface of the huge reservoir.

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

Fractured Slab

December 16, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Stained and fractured rock slabs in the Yosemite National Park backcountry

This “intimate landscape” photograph of what is, objectively speaking, no more than a crack separating two pieces of granite actually tells a number of more interesting and complex stories. At least one of them is a story of the events of the day on which the photograph was made, while others are much older stories, bits of which can be seen in the rocks.

The story of this day involved wildfire. On the day we arrived at our camp in this area, the Yosemite “Meadow” fire took off in the area bounded roughly by Half Dome, Clouds Rest, and Mount Starr King. There was barely any smoke visible in the early morning, but as winds rose to surprising levels, the fire took off… and by late in the day the sky was filled with smoke that sometimes blotted out the sun and turned the sky an odd yellow-brown color. These rocks are stained a sort of reddish-brown, but the warm colors are enhanced a great deal by this smoky light. The older stories are complex and I cannot attempt to tell them completely here, but there are a few things to notice and think about in this rock scene. The area was glaciated, and the smooth rock surface at lower left and lower right is glacial polish, which provides evidence of the slow, grinding passage of an ancient glacier. The crack in the exfoliated granite provides evidence of other forces of weather that work slowly but irresistibly to weather and break up even this strong granite.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: mountains

Spillway Lake

Utah Dawn Sky

Boat, San Luis Reservoir

Fractured Slab

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