Tag Archives: panamint

Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature

Rock-Covered Hill, Desert Haze

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Rock-Covered Hill, Desert Haze
A small hill covered with rocks, the salt flats, and distant mountains, Death Valley National Park

Rock-Covered Hill, Desert Haze. Death Valley National Park, California. April 5, 2017. © Copyright 2017 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A small hill covered with rocks, the salt flats, and distant mountains, Death Valley National Park

I distinctly recall my somewhat unusual first view of Death Valley. It was perhaps about twenty years ago. My oldest son was in a school “hiking and biking” club, and their annual “Big Trip” was to be an adventure in Death Valley involving hiking, backpacking, and more. Most of the group traveled to the park on a small bus, though I joined a group of parent chaperones and the club adviser/teacher in an old Chevy Suburban, highly modified and loaded down with backpacks and other gear for more than thirty people. We drove all day and entered the park after sunset. Because it was late we stopped at the first available camp ground, the Emigrant campground along highway 190 partway down the route below Towne Pass. We set up camp in complete darkness, unaware of our surroundings, in a landscape that I had never before seen.

Early in the morning, perhaps shortly after dawn, I crawled out of my tent and in this light saw the immense light-filled space of this great Valley for the first time, a view that extended down the gigantic fan on which we were camped, the distant valley floor thousands of feet below, and the rugged mountains on the far side of the valley. I had never seen a raw landscape like this before, with no visible plant life and its geology laid bare — a place of rock, sand, haze, juxtaposed shapes, textures, often-subtle colors, and huge distances. There is, I think, a bit of that in this photograph, which includes a dark, rocky hill that I have looked at many times, its ridge sloping the opposite direction from the distant dark hills across the valley, barely visible through the opaque atmosphere.

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: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature

Death Valley From The Panamint Range

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Death Valley From The Panamint Range
Looking down from the ridge of the Panamint Range toward Death Valley

Death Valley From The Panamint Range. Death Valley National Park, California. April 4, 2017. © Copyright 2017 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Looking down from the ridge of the Panamint Range toward Death Valley

I have paused near this spot many times while traveling in the Panamint Mountains of Death Valley, sometimes thinking about making a photograph but never quite seeing it. It probably hasn’t helped that I’ve typically been on my way to another location as I passed by, and I didn’t really want to linger here too long while the light was waiting for me at my destination. In fact, on my outward journey I more or less passed right by this time, too. I went on to my destination, spent time there making photographs of a subject that I had in mind, took time to fix breakfast “on the road,” and then turned back.

By the time I passed by this spot again on the return trip it was well past the typical photography hours in Death Valley, where the light can become quite harsh and washed out closer to the middle of the day. But this time that seemed to almost work to my advantage, especially since a bit to thin high cloudiness muted the light just a bit, and the distant haze in the Valley helped produce a near-far distance effect. So I stopped, in a spot close to by not exactly where I had previous thought about photographing, noticed that the hills at the close edge of the Valley were just visible through the slot between the converging slopes on either side of the gully, and made a photograph which I anticipated would become a monochrome image.

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

Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Ghost Towns, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Structures and Objects

Abandoned Stamp Mill

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Abandoned Stamp Mill
An abandoned water-powered stamp mill high in the Panamint Range, Death Valley National Park

Abandoned Stamp Mill. Death Valley National Park, California. April 4, 2017. © Copyright 2017 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

An abandoned water-powered stamp mill high in the Panamint Range, Death Valley National Park

It seems that every national park or monument has both a natural and human story, or perhaps what might be seen as a story about the relationship between the two. While the power of natural forces (heat, water, geology, and more) is abundantly obvious in the huge, austere landscape of Death Valley National Park, the human history of the place is rarely far from view. It begins with the evidence of people who lived here long before European-origin settlers came to the place, evidence that can be seen in rock art scattered throughout the park, in the recognition that many settlements (current and now-abandoned) have a very much longer history than we may think, and in the remnants of those earlier populations who still occupy and identify with this landscape.

Perhaps more obvious is the more recent history of those who came to look for mining success. (There are places in the park where this still takes place.) Some examples are obvious to the casual visitor, but the more time you spend in the back-country area of the park the more you understand that this particular history is everywhere — though not usually as obvious as this example. This stamp mill, built to crush gold ore, is amazing in a number of ways. Perched at the end of high ridge in rather remote location, it was powered in the most unlikely manner… by water piped in from a spring over twenty miles away. The location is stupendous, and it is easy to think that practical issues may not have been the only considerations in choosing the site. From here one can look down thousands of feet to broad alluvial slopes leading towards Death Valley, but one can also look further into the distance and see the snow-covered peaks of the Sierra Nevada.

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

Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature

Desert Spring

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Desert Spring
Pools of desert water reflect sunrise light on distant mountains, Death Valley National Park

Desert Spring. Death Valley National Park, California. March 31, 2015. © Copyright 2015 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Pools of desert water reflect sunrise light on distant mountains, Death Valley National Park

Although it is dawn in this photograph, I had already been up and photographing for some time before I took a break to walk along an observation area and next to the highway at this popular location. The pools of water have their source underground at the base of the tall mountains standing behind my camera position.

Beyond the water are salt flats, some in the “classic” flat white style, and others in the inhospitable and rugged “Devil’s Golf Course” style. The foreground water reflects the morning blue sky, and further out it reflects the ridge of the Panamint Mountains on the far side of the Valley.

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 | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | LinkedIn | Email

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