Tag Archives: peaks

Photographs: Albania, Photographs: Europe, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Travel

Afternoon Shower, Albanian Alps

Image April 12, 2025 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

My experience in Albania is extremely limited — a single day driving from Kosovo up into the Valbona Valley, to what I believe was the end of the road. We started in Kosovo lowlands, gradually ascended, and passed through small towns. Eventually the land became more rural, somewhere we crossed the border, and we saw signs of past military conflicts in the valley. At the end of the road there is a big lodge where we stopped to eat and admire the stunning panorama of alpine peaks looming above us.

The weather was the sort where it is sunny but there’s so much humidity that a shower could develop at any moment. That’s precisely what happened here as we headed back toward Kosovo – a cloud passed by and surprised is with some rain. (“Hey, it is raining! And the sun is out!”) This is some of my favorite light — dappled sunlight moving across the landscape of mountains and trees, with peaks looming overhead as mist swirls and gentle rain falls.

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.

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

Photographs: Albania, Photographs: Europe, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Travel

Albanian Alps, Valbona Valley

Image April 11, 2025 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

We visited Kosovo and Croatia and briefly entered a few other Balkan countries back in the summer of 2023 during a very long trip to Europe. There’s a lot to say about this remarkable and complex part of Southern Europe — more than will fit in one post. We stayed in Kosovo, at the home of people with extended family connections. Our closest Kosovo family contact enthusiastically showed us many places we would not have seen had we traveled on our own. One day we headed briefly into the mountains of Albania.

I have to admit to almost complete ignorance about this part of the world. Like most Americans, my knowledge was limited to very outdated Cold War history and a vague recollection of the war there during the Clinton administration. I knew literally nothing of the people or the landscape. Imagine my surprise when our drive took us deep into the Albanian Alps, where the scenery competes with the most spectacular mountains of my California Sierra Nevada.

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

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sky

Mono Craters, Evening Cloudscape

Image November 20, 2024 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

I made this photograph at the end of a beautiful afternoon of aspen photography that was enhanced by the passage of impressive thunder storms. I had completed the day’s aspen photography and dropped back down into the high desert along US 395 in the Mono Lake area when the clouds began to thin and break up and glow in evening light. Here some lenticular clouds were forming over the Mono Craters.

The Mono Craters comprise an interesting bit of geology that we might not automatically associate with the Sierra Nevada. We tend to think of the range being built by the uplift of gigantic “blobs” of granite, with deeply eroded overlaying material above. But volcanic processes were at work out here, too. Mono Craters are a particularly obvious example that you cannot miss as you drive south from Mono Lake — and part of a chain of volcanic cones extending from the north short of the lake to south of Mammoth Mountain.

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, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

Links: Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Info.

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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

East Side Morning

Image November 18, 2024 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

There are few sights more beautiful and spectacular than a shoulder-season sunrise on the eastern escarpment of the Sierra Nevada. Believe me, it is well worth getting up long before sunrise and putting on all of your warm clothes! Many of the best views on these mornings are from a distance away from the base of the mountains, where you have a clear view that stretches from the high desert at the base of the range right on up to rugged, snow-covered summits.

While my main goal for heading out there in late September and early October is to photograph the changing fall colors, the light and atmosphere change, too as summer fades and autumn arrives. When I went there on this visit I had just returned from two-and-a-half months of overseas travel, and I was missing “my Sierra!” I headed into the high country to set up camp, and from there I wandered on foot and by vehicle — and on this morning my wandering took me out into the high desert east of the range before dawn.