MonikaC
Well-Known Member
On Nov 3, 2018, my husband was finally released from the terrible pain of pancreatic cancer. He had been diagnosed less than 8 weeks before. We were fortunate enough to have a very good friend be in the position to leave his life & wife in OR to live with us & be our advocate. We kept calling him our angel. How he managed everything was absolutely amazing.
A week after Chips death, I was able to get out of Dodge. Packed up the dog & headed west. Our 30th anniversary was earlier in the year, but our busy schedules kept us from celebrating. We had planned to go 5 months later, in October, on a road trip to the Ancient Bristlecones. Instead, I went in on a memorial trip in November. Those ancient, enduring trees were an important step in my healing. I was able to find clarity & wholeness in the wilderness of the Eastern Sierras; finding beauty & calm while my dog bounded joyously through the meadows.
These shots have been minimally processed on my laptop, so all c&c are welcome for when I get home & have my desktop to work on the processing.
First stop was Zion. The high was in the low 40s and the ranger at the backcountry desk cautioned that there was probably ice there. She also talked about how much trail work they’d done there & emphasized to stay in the river bottom. The trail was much easier to find than previously (maybe because it was my 3rd time), and almost all of the photographers were coming out by the time I got to Archangel Falls, where 1 other photographer was on his way in.
Across from the cut where people shoot the rushing water with leaves on the sides, icicles hung from the vegetation. It was hard to shoot it because of the bright sky and ice from the drips below, so I settled for a documentary shot.
At the Subway, the only icicles were the size of Vienna sausages, which was disappointing, but I was the only photographer there. The other fellow politely waited below until I was done (kind of unheard of!)
Next stop was the Bristlecones. Upon arrival, I had time to walk the little nature trail at the Schulman Grove. The trees that everybody shoots (Jim Fox said one is called the Sentinel and I’ve also heard it called the Galaxy Tree) now have most of the shattered rock that keeps the competition down for the bristlecones is gone: pretty clearly paths of photographers getting to their tripod placement. There are signs asking people to keep off of it.
The next day I went to the Patriarch Grove, with stops along the way. That grove was my husbands favorite. I had it and the Grandview Campground to myself all night and through the next morning. It was a turning point in finding peace.
On up to Mono Lake. I camped a few miles past South Tufa, with the dog curled up next to me. At 19 degrees, I was ready to get moving in the morning. The smoke from the other side of the Sierras hardly made it over to the east side & there was a decidedly un-spectacular sunrise (as was the sunset). I went to a place outside of the Park (so I could take my dog) that I’d been to about 9 years previously. I thought of it as the Place of 1000 Tarns, though the official name is 20 Lake Basin. I found some interesting ice patterns in some of the lakes under North Mountain.
While some of us are fortunate enough to go to where there are hundreds of these ice bubbles, I found just this one. I did, however, decide that it was just perfect.
A week after Chips death, I was able to get out of Dodge. Packed up the dog & headed west. Our 30th anniversary was earlier in the year, but our busy schedules kept us from celebrating. We had planned to go 5 months later, in October, on a road trip to the Ancient Bristlecones. Instead, I went in on a memorial trip in November. Those ancient, enduring trees were an important step in my healing. I was able to find clarity & wholeness in the wilderness of the Eastern Sierras; finding beauty & calm while my dog bounded joyously through the meadows.
These shots have been minimally processed on my laptop, so all c&c are welcome for when I get home & have my desktop to work on the processing.
First stop was Zion. The high was in the low 40s and the ranger at the backcountry desk cautioned that there was probably ice there. She also talked about how much trail work they’d done there & emphasized to stay in the river bottom. The trail was much easier to find than previously (maybe because it was my 3rd time), and almost all of the photographers were coming out by the time I got to Archangel Falls, where 1 other photographer was on his way in.
Across from the cut where people shoot the rushing water with leaves on the sides, icicles hung from the vegetation. It was hard to shoot it because of the bright sky and ice from the drips below, so I settled for a documentary shot.
At the Subway, the only icicles were the size of Vienna sausages, which was disappointing, but I was the only photographer there. The other fellow politely waited below until I was done (kind of unheard of!)
Next stop was the Bristlecones. Upon arrival, I had time to walk the little nature trail at the Schulman Grove. The trees that everybody shoots (Jim Fox said one is called the Sentinel and I’ve also heard it called the Galaxy Tree) now have most of the shattered rock that keeps the competition down for the bristlecones is gone: pretty clearly paths of photographers getting to their tripod placement. There are signs asking people to keep off of it.
The next day I went to the Patriarch Grove, with stops along the way. That grove was my husbands favorite. I had it and the Grandview Campground to myself all night and through the next morning. It was a turning point in finding peace.
On up to Mono Lake. I camped a few miles past South Tufa, with the dog curled up next to me. At 19 degrees, I was ready to get moving in the morning. The smoke from the other side of the Sierras hardly made it over to the east side & there was a decidedly un-spectacular sunrise (as was the sunset). I went to a place outside of the Park (so I could take my dog) that I’d been to about 9 years previously. I thought of it as the Place of 1000 Tarns, though the official name is 20 Lake Basin. I found some interesting ice patterns in some of the lakes under North Mountain.
While some of us are fortunate enough to go to where there are hundreds of these ice bubbles, I found just this one. I did, however, decide that it was just perfect.
