The Road To Zion

Thanks for all of the kind feedback on my last post. Here’s the continuation of the story, starting a few hours after witnessing the northern lights in Monument Valley.

After staying up until midnight chasing aurora, we woke at 3:30 AM to meet our Navajo guide Carl Phillips for 2 hour off-road journey up Hunt’s Mesa for sunrise. As amazing as the scenery was up there, Carl and the harrowing ride up the mesa in the dark were just as interesting and awesome. I can still hear his calm voice in my head, describing Navajo concepts of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ energies while his SUV lurched in every direction up cliffs that I was sure we couldn’t climb. Our faith in Carl was strong!

We arrived long before sunrise, with stars still overhead and the first hints of daylight on the horizon. Deep in what photographer’s call the ‘blue hour’, we made our first exposures, revealing the astonishing landscape below.

We exclaimed with joy when we saw what appeared on the cameras. This is one of the great things about photography. Sometimes the camera “sees in the dark”, revealing even more wonder than we can behold without this aid. I think there’s nothing wrong with this. In fact, I celebrate it!

The light kept getting better, and as the stars faded, the landscape took on the ethereal glow that of desert twilight. The fact that we were in lands that are sacred to the Navajo wasn’t lost on us. We were very grateful to be there with Carl.

This is a small portion of the view, and what I believe was the strongest composition.

To take in more of the scene, I made this panorama.

This was just an astonishing view, one of the best I’ve ever seen.

From there we drove to Page, Arizona, rented our own Jeep for some sunset explorations of the famous White Pocket area. After a week of alien landscapes, this one might have been the strangest and most unique. It’s a small area, but looked like it could be worth days of exploring. Again, I am eager to return and figure out how to better photograph it.

This really was a photographer’s paradise, especially because of the endless ‘foregrounds’ we had to pair with the moody sunset sky we had during our visit.

The blue hour light was even more interesting. This had just enough dimensionality to show the shapes and contours of the land really well. Although the composition below is a bit busy, it might give you these best sense of what it actually felt like to be there, with the delineations of the strange white rock in the pocket with the more classic red sandstone surrounding. A few sparse trees and patches of vegetation can also be found. I’d love to return after a rain and photograph some of the puddles that form in this crazy landscape.

I mean, come on… What the heck is going on here?

We were totally exhausted by this point, after driving for hours and sleeping very little. Thankfully, we didn’t have to get up early for sunrise in Page the next morning, because we were going in the famous Antelope Canyon for a tour with another Navajo guide, Jonas.

We had heard a lot of negative things about this beforehand, with folks warning us that the tours were crowded and that we would be rushed through and not be able to make good photos.

That was not our experience. In fact, we had a blast! It was mind-boggling to witness and we felt comfortable and often couldn’t see anyone else around us in the tight, winding passages through this beautifully carved sandstone.

The times when we could see other people, I felt like they added to the sense of scale and power of this amazing place. This was a quick snap with the cell phone as we walked in.

When I got out the big camera, the colors and details became much more clear.

I loved looking up into this amazing swirl.

This well-known feature was pretty awesome to behold.

While I like the images I came away with from here, I look forward to finding new perspectives the next time I visit here. I feel like this is another one of those places with pretty endless possibilities.

From there the journey continued on to Zion National Park. I had heard good things about Zion, and had a feeling, even beforehand, that this was somewhere I wanted to really spend some time, so this was the longest portion of our trip, at 3 days.

On our way over, we passed what from a distance looked like a herd of cows on the move. Upon closer inspection, we could see that these weren’t cows. Cool!

Getting into the park, I decided to walk instead of take the bus to our sunset location. I’m so glad I did! Walking the Pa’rus Trail from the Visitor Center, I spotted these trees in front of the Towers of the Virgin right from the path. I had never seen a photo from here, and it might be my favorite from my whole time in Zion. My first one in the park! The sweeping side/back light played a huge role and I’m very lucky to have seen this.

The view from the pedestrian bridge looking back at the Watchman was a little more cliche, but no less beautiful. It was great standing here as the last light turned the sandstone red. The autumn colors of the foliage around the Virgin River were still going strong, too. What an amazing place!

From here we had a decision to make. It looked like clouds were coming in overhead by morning, with a window of clear skies to the east. Y’all know what that means, right? Potential for a great sunrise.

The thing is, I didn’t know of any sunrise spots in Zion. I looked at the map and noticed another location I was very curious about, Bryce Canyon, was a two hour drive away. That meant less sleep, waking up at 4 AM, but I really liked the potential to see something special here.

Thankfully, I was right about the light. It was awesome. I was also blown away by the scenery here! What a cool place!

Most of my time here focused on the well-known rock formation known as Thor’s Hammer. As you can see, it’s a pretty cool feature!

This was one of those situations where I wasn’t sure that the sky was adding to the scene or distracting, photographically.

After photographing the hammer extensively, I scanned the scene and came up with many other photo opportunities. Here, the sky was no longer a distraction and the light on the landscape created an incredible glow as it reflected off of the red sandstone pillars.

A few other folks finally came down the trail after having sunrise completely to ourselves. I liked including them in the scene for scale and storytelling purposes.

This place was a long-lens dream, with so many scenes like this to be picked out at 200mm.

It was just too much fun, and though I wanted to stay and hike around down around the hoodoos, we decided to head back to Zion.

On our way back, we passed an abandoned homestead. There weren’t any no trespassing signs, so we got out and looked around. I don’t know what the story is here, but there was a ton of discarded metal and the remains of what looked like a cattle farm. It was overgrown and fascinating. This stuff holds almost as much appeal to me as the natural wonders of the area. I love seeing how people live and fit into nature.

I’m glad we got to see this, but I really wish I knew the story behind who lived here, how long ago, and what happened to the place.

We returned to Zion National Park again through the East entrance, which I feel is the more dramatic side. I’m so glad that this was my introduction to the park. My jaw dropped in amazement at this insane landscape. It felt like some of the rock formations we had seen at White Pocket, only on a much grander scale.

With that in mind, we decided to take in sunrise over here on our last morning together, and were treated to… yet more amazing skies. Seriously, how lucky were we on this whole trip with all of the amazing skies?

After photographing this little tree perched on a cool rock from every angle, I thought I had come away with something unique. That is, until I saw this same formation on a t-shirt in the Visitor Center later. Oh, well.

That same morning, I climbed up one of the sandstone hills to get this view looking west, with Bridge Mountain being hit by the first rays of morning sunlight.

Then, sadly, it was time to say goodbye to Bill and Ed, and continue my journey by myself for the next 36 hours. I decided to make the journey up the Narrows, a well-known hike in Zion, something I knew beforehand that I would be doing on my own since the hike was almost 10 miles through sometimes waist deep water.

I rented boots and wading gear from Zion Outfitters, but ended up getting soaked anyways. Despite that, I had a great time.

I hiked from the start of the trail all the way up to Big Spring and back. One of the big surprises I encountered was the wildlife. I saw this deer making his way up the Narrows.

And a sweet flycatcher nearby.

Focusing on smaller scenes with interesting compositions was very satisfying.

But the medium-scene is where I like to live, for the most part. This most mimics my experience and my way of seeing, I find.

The next day, I cancelled my permit to hike into the Subway, a well-known and what looks like an amazing location, because of the forecast for rain. We were expected to get over an inch, and there was no way I was going to risk being washed away in a flash flood. It’s a good thing I did, because the water I saw moving through the park later that day was pretty darn impressive.

I decided to head to East Zion, again, and enjoyed capturing scenes in the moody mist as rain showers passed through.

I checked out this popular trail known as the Canyon Overlook. I liked the perspective from further back even more than the view from the overlook itself. I chose to use the place where everyone stands as a foreground and zoom in on the distant peaks. This made a much more interesting image, in my opinion. The weather coming through helped with the mood quite a bit.

Driving back to the main canyon from the historic tunnel, I saw more awesome mountain views through the swirling mists. So, I turned around and pulled over, walked up the road, and made this image. It’s another one of my favorites from the trip. I loved the peaks wreathed in clouds and the trees leaning into them.

It rained off and on throughout the day, and at one point we even had a strong storm with thunder, hail, and winds move through. All of that water had to go somewhere, and these ephemeral waterfalls appeared between two of the most majestic peaks in Zion, The Sentinel and Abraham Peak, which is one of the Three Patriarchs.

The hike over here on the Sand Bench Trail was one of my favorites of the trip.

Knowing there were more waterfalls to check out, I also hiked up the Emerald Pools Trail. The water was absolutely ripping here, and walking behind the waterfalls resulted in a very wet, but very fun, experience.

Check out the folks in the blue raincoats. We were all soaked!

Standing behind the waterfall was fun, but also, standing on top of it, which was easily done because there’s a fence up here that keeps everyone from going over the edge. How nice!

You can see that more rain was incoming right as I made this photo. I loved how the stream led the eye into the canyon below and then rose again with the terrain on the opposite side. I’m not used to all of this elevation.

After this, it was time for a good night’s rest, and to head home the next morning. I missed my family pretty bad, so I was looking forward to getting back.

I passed through the Valley of Fire outside of Las Vegas on my way back. One last look at these otherworldly landscapes on the Colorado Plateau.

That’s it for my desert trip this year. I’ve already made plans to come back next November, and sold out the two back-to-back weeklong workshops I put together that follows this itinerary. If you’d like to read more about this trip and join the waitlist, click HERE. I’ll likely be adding 2027 dates soon!