Grand Teton National Park

“Begin Again” - The Grand Tetons from across Jackson Lake

If you love jagged edge mountains as much as I do this should be one of your favorite parks. I’m sure I’ve only scratched the surface of this place, but the views are amazing almost anywhere you find yourself. The top picture here was taken on a beach off the side of the road that travels along Jackson Lake, and you have this view for most of that drive. The park is situated just south of Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming and may be overshadowed by the more famous park. I’m not here to say one is better than the other, I love them both, but it usually seems easier to find yourself alone with the mountains down in the Tetons. It’s easy to visit both parks on the same trip anyway, so there’s no need to decide between them. On the trip where these photos were taken my friends and I only spent a day here, I wouldn’t say that’s enough time but you can definitely still see a lot.

“Falling” - Water falls running down the side of the mountains from south of Jenny Lake.

All of the pictures in this post are from my most recent trip to the Tetons in October 2018. It was my second time visiting but the first time I really took the time to enjoy it. We drove into the park from the south through Jackson Hole. From there you’re greeted with amazing close up views of the mountains right from the road and pull offs. I used a telephoto lens for the image above to bring out the waterfalls coming down the sides, taken at one of those pull offs.

“Introspection” - Grand Teton from across Jenny Lake.

Most of this trip was spend around Jenny Lake, a beautiful area south of the larger Jackson Lake. Above was one of my first views in the area, not far from the visitor center. There are plenty of trails around but I think some of my favorite views are a few hundred feet from the parking lot.

“Hidden Falls” - Off of a trail near Jenny Lake.

That trail we took went to Hidden Falls, a waterfall somewhat into the woods along the lake. Now I thought it was about a 1 mile hike, but somehow I had read the map from the other side of the lake and it was actually closer to 6, my friends didn’t trust me to read the maps after that. Still it wasn’t a bad hike and you have some great views of the lake and eventually the waterfall at the end. Just make sure you’re prepared for a little more than a quick walk in the park unless you actually know where you are.

“Jenny Lake” - A view of the mountains across Jenny Lake from some paths near the visitor center.

And here’s another shot from Jenny Lake, appropriately called Jenny Lake because I thought it kind of captured the essence of the area. We left from here and drove north alongside Jackson Lake while the sun began to set. With a few stops along the way including the one where I took the picture at the top of this post we had driven through the park by nightfall. I think that’s one of the great appeals of this park, most of what you want to see is readily accessible, and if you want to see a bit more there are plenty of hikes to gorgeous spots as well. We only spent one full day here, I could definitely spend more but any amount of time seems to be worth it.

Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument

Outside of Paria

The Grand Staircase-Escalante is a large National Monument in southern Utah. It was originally established in 1996 by President Bill Clinton as a 1,880,461 acre monument managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM,). In 2017 President Donald Trump reduced the size of the monument to 1,003,863 acres. There are 3 distinct areas of the monument, the Grand Staircase, Kaiparowits, and Escalante Canyon. It's one of the more diverse monuments and is most often characterized by it's colorful cliffs, slot canyons, and various desert monoliths.

I went there for the first time in March 2017 and spent some time in the Paria area, which is basically this road leading to the remains of a ghost town. I thought it would actually be a ghost town with buildings and what not but it's really just some markers of where the town used to be, although the graveyard is still there. The easily definable layers in the cliffs and the vast stretches of the plateaus and mesas in this area give a clear view of the staircase that gives the monument it's name. You can see an image I captured from just off the road here on the top of this post. And keep in mind this "road" is not for the faint of heart. It seems like a normal dirt road when you first start out but around a particular corner the you'll find yourself driving on the top of these cliffs that drop off on either side. It's really not as bad as it feels once you step out of the car though, and in my opinion the best views are from the side of this road.

Toadstool Hoodoos

I was back in the staircase almost exactly one year later (this past March) and hiked into the famous Toadstool Hoodoos. This is one of the more surreal places in the area in my opinion. It's maybe a mile hike into the back area where you reach a plateau lined with cliffs and these odd shaped monoliths jutting out all over it.

The hike isn't all too strenuous, but does require you to either not mind walking on a one foot wide path with a 30 foot drop on either side or find a way to climb up a 5-10 foot cliff. Either way being there is definitely worth it.

That's all I've seen so far of this monument, I'll just keep chipping away at seeing little pieces of it. The small sections I have seen are definitely worth a visit though.

My National Park & Monument List

Long Island beach photography in the winter

"Follow" December 2017

I guess I like solitude, and nothing quite says it like a cold beach covered in snow. It's empty here this time of year, not like a warm summer day when you can barely find room to get to the water. I think it's the idea of taking a photo of something that's normally associated with warmth and relaxation and then showing it in a completely different way. It's so much more interesting in the winter, and it changes so quickly. One day it might look nearly identical to how it does in the summer, just without all of the people, and the next it could be covered in snow and ice. I particularly like finding the transitional phases of it, like a few days after a snowstorm when the sand starts to come through from beneath the snow. The first image here is an example of that from Hecksher State Park a little over a month ago. I had this spot in mind and waited until it just started warming up so that the snow cover would be receding.

"Fading" January 2018

This  next image is from the same park a few weeks later. The park looks over the Great South Bay which freezes over if it's been well below freezing for a few days. I didn't put too much planning into when I came here this time, I just wanted to get some shots over the frozen landscape. I had noticed on the forecast that some fog was going to be rolling in and I think that added an interesting element because the background blurs out to the point that you can't really see the land on the other side of the bay. It's kind of like faking an arctic scene or something. Those streams that form on top of the ice make for some convenient leading lines too, especially when I noticed this one catching the pink light from the sunset. In a few days all of this ice will be gone, and it will look like it does in the summer for a while.

"Reaching" January 2017

That's why I liked the idea of including this one. It's from Robert Moses which is an ocean beach so it never freezes over like the bay can. It's an interesting contrast though because it's just a few miles away and taken in the same month (though a year earlier) and looks just like a typical beach. Nothing really wintery about it, but the emptiness and cool blues can kind of give you a sense of the cold. The photo below is of the same beach after another snowfall this January.

"Swept" January 2018

A completely different feeling from nearly the same exact location at the same time of year. The way the winds mix the snow and sand give a really cool effect, and one that's only there for a few days if that. All of these beaches are awesome environments to photograph in the winter. You can't go two days in a row and expect the same landscape like you can in the summer, and on top of that you usually have most of it to yourself. So if you're tired of the cold, go to the beach. And if you're not able to overlook the fact that this advice won't make you warmer then get a flight to the desert - which just happens to be what I'm doing in March. 

I'm starting to sell some prints on my website here if you're interested. I may add more soon but if you are looking for a specific image of mine let me know.