Only got a few blisters on this short 18 mile overnight trip. This was more like a pit stop on the way back home from visting my family in Sparks, Nevada. Had the girlfriend drop me off at the Mammoth Mountain resort and took the bus to the trailhead.

I decided to leave the trail from Ediza Lake and do a ltttle bit of cross country. I ended up finding a nice little tarn under the sierra crest and the place where the Dec 08 OP mag cover shot was taken but then had to scale down the cliffs on the right side of this picture to get to where I was going to be meeting my ride home the following day. One of the guys which I never met before handed me a nice cold tall can of Saporo (no I wasn't dreaming thanks Dav:beer). After hiking all afternoon to about 10k ft I caught a nice buzz. Good thing I found them otherwise I'd be hitch hiking home. These 5D MII batteries are amazing. Enough blah blah, hope you enjoy the image.

Nothing grows higher than a Sky Pilot in the Sierra Nevada. Growing right of the scree slopes of Mt. Agassiz staring at the Dusy Basin and off into LeConte Canyon in the distance. The rocks just bounce off these little dense bush like flowers only centimeters tall. Guess you can say I appreciate the smaller things in life.

Sky Pilot is also a common name for a person leading other's to heaven. Not trying to say I'm taking you there but it's as close as you can get on your own 2 legs in the mountains California while still having flowers at your feet.

"Artificial Sun"
Kings Canyon National Park
This was taken at very end of twilight. The trees were lit with a head lamp during a 30 sec exposure. I left my intervolometer/cable relase at home so 30 secs for every shot with the self timer was getting to me. It's the moon around 9pm taken over an hour past sunset. The moon isn't close to setting yet but the peaks around 11,900 ft elevation and the lake is at around 10,900ft so it actually not setting until about midnight. The intervolometer is a just a cable release w/ some timer funtions on it. It's a good tool to have in case your sleepy and forget that you left your DSLR on bulb all night long. After backpacking the 8.5 miles to get here and missing sunset I felt the need create something. I gave it a touch of the orton effect(learned from Marc Muench) to give it some dreaminess.
John Muir Wilderness - Eastern Sierra Nevada Range, CA
Canon 5D 17-40mm at 17mm Iso 200

Summer Spring
John Muir Wilderness - Eastern Sierra Nevada Mountain Range, California

Desert Gold in the Wind

It's a wonder why it is so hard for flowers in Death Valley to try and stay alive much past their peak. Beyond the heat of the day they also have to deal with constant wind and sand storms.

I really liked how the the hair on the stems was backlighting as the sun set behind a giant sand storm. It was a little tough to pull off with the dust, sand and rocks flying around.

One exposure and double RAW processed.
1/30 f22 iso 50
I picked a lot of movement for a 1/30 of second. I bracketed the scene and went with the underexposed file because I could pull enough detail out of it and still get the sun to come out not too overexposed.

Darwin Falls
Death Valley National Park

Upper Emerald Pool Zion National Park, Utah (green) - Steve Sieren

Lupine Island

Canopy Light

Redwood National Parks

A small shaft of midday light penetrates through the redwood canopy of Northern California's Temperate Rainforest.