The Terra Galleria Blog by QT Luong

Wildlife along the Trail

Posted on October 31, 2024, 5:09 pm, by QT Luong, under Uncategorized.

“Landscape without wildlife is just scenery” is a quote used by Kris Tompkins, the subject of the inspirational Wild Life (2023) movie, to discuss the world’s largest rewilding project that she and Doug Tompkins initiated in Patagonia. It would appear that the ribbon of land along suburban Coyote Creek Trail isn’t doing too badly as a landscape. No rewilding has occured there, yet I have seen a varied array of wildlife along the trail, besides an incredible number of cats. While remaining within the city limits of San Jose, California, I have been able to have encounters with the Other in an unexpected place within walking distance from our home.

That is not to say that every trip to the trail will result in a wildlife sighting beyond squirrels. Despite well over a hundred visits to the Coyote Creek Trail, I have seen a bobcat only twice. Interestingly, the protected red foxes are much easier to spot, as they like to stalk the Los Lago Golf Course bisected by the trail. I’ve been told that they steal sandwiches from unsuspecting golfers. In May of last year, I noticed a photographer carrying a telephoto lens, unlike me. As I came closer, he called me by my name. He was a friend from my years in Berkeley that I hadn’t seen for decades. Chris Gould had traveled from Marin County expressly to photograph those habituated red foxes. I have seen wild pigs on four occasions. Confident in their strength, those dangerous animals are not skittish. Deer are more common, but given my self-imposed wide-angle lens for this project – which made the isolated small bird on the ground an unlikely photograph – I have not been able to get a photograph close enough as they tend to flee quickly. The namesake coyote has remained elusive. I’ve encountered quite a few in the hills. However, the riparian environment of the trail is not their preferred habitat unlike birds, some of which are mentioned in the Santa Clara Valley Bird Alliance guide. By the way, in America, it is easy to take squirrels for granted, but the first time I visited from France, I was astonished to see one on the lawn of the White House in Washington, DC. I didn’t remember having seen any in urban or suburban settings in France. As a child, it was a treat to spot one in the pine forest along the Atlantic Ocean where we went camping in the summer.

I’ve posted twelve of my wildlife images from the Coyote Creek Trail below. After you look through these, please use the form at the bottom of this post to list your five favorites (the numbers are below the photographs). Thank you for your input! Comments are welcome!

If you do not see the form below, click here.

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Tags: california, coyote creek, nature, photography, wildlife
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The Trouble with Wilderness

Posted on October 14, 2024, 11:26 pm, by QT Luong, under Esthetics.

Finding meaning often begins with crafting a personal narrative. When we shape our experiences into stories, we discover clarity, purpose, and a deeper connection to ourselves. With that in mind, while reflecting on my work in landscape photography, I realized that its development mirrored the historic evolution of the genre, and also of environmentalism. I’ve crafted a more detailed story, however, what follows is a quick outline. I picked up a camera to document the High Alps in the documentary spirit of the 19th-century American survey photographers. In thirty years of nature photography in America’s public lands following the tradition of conservation-minded, expressive photographers of the modernist era such as Ansel Adams and Eliot Porter, I became the first to photograph each of the 63 U.S. National Parks in large format. The post-modern era brought to photography the detached artistic vision of the New Topographics and to environmental thought the shift from preserving the wild as sacred and separate sanctuaries to also acknowledging it in human-influenced environments. In that spirit, I extended my work to the infrastructure of our experiences of nature and the landscapes of the places where we live.

Ironically, my work in the national parks was the accidental catalyst for the later evolution. After Ken Burns and Dayton Duncan invited me to be part of their PBS film series The National Parks: America’s Best Idea (2009), I was privileged to meet some artists and writers interviewed in the series at promotional events. Among them, ranger Shelton Johnson, the series’s unexpected star, became a friend. Even though I did not meet all of the interviewees, I was exposed to their work for the first time, and several made a strong impression. Terry Tempest Williams spoke as beautifully as she writes. The eminent environmental historian William Cronon appeared repeatedly in the series to provide intellectual insights. I eventually found a collection of essays he edited, Uncommon Ground: Rethinking the Human Place in Nature (1995), which examine the implication of different cultural ideas of nature for modern environmental problems. The essays challenge traditional ideas about nature, suggesting that what we perceive as “natural” is deeply influenced by human culture, history, and politics. Contributors argue that nature is not a pristine, separate entity but something humans constantly shape and redefine through their actions, beliefs, and technologies.

The idea was not entirely new. At that time, I was reading Alexander Wilson’s brilliant book The Culture of Nature: North American Landscape from Disney to the Exxon Valdez (1991). Wilson pioneered investigating how our experience of nature is shaped and commodified by cultural forces, how landscapes are manipulated for human consumption, and how media, tourism, and industry influence our perceptions of the natural world. Yet it is the essay The Trouble with Wilderness: or, Getting Back to the Wrong Nature included at the beginning of Uncommon Ground that most deeply influenced my understanding of the concept of wildness and sparked my interest in photographing nature closer to home rather than only in distant parklands. My travels in the wilderness and countries around the world had been motivated by the desire to encounter otherness. Could I learn to see it next door? In the essay, Cronon critiques the romanticized concept of wilderness as an untouched, pristine space separate from human activity. He argues that this idealized notion of wilderness, rooted in 19th-century American thought, has led to problematic environmental attitudes. By elevating wilderness as the only “pure” form of nature, we overlook the environments in which most people live and diminish the value of everyday landscapes. Cronon encourages a rethinking of nature as something interwoven with human history and culture, advocating for a more inclusive and responsible relationship with all environments—not just remote, protected wilderness areas. The influential essay is reproduced on Cronon’s website, but since it exceeds 10,000 words, I am providing a “Cliff notes” version below the photographs.

I am fortunate that two dozen nature parks lie within a half-an-hour drive from my home in San Jose, California, the largest city in Northern California. Some are reclaimed lands, while others are still leased for cattle grazing. I did not seek remarkable light but visited them midday like most residents. Yet I experienced the qualities of wilderness in them, which I tried to convey in images with romantic reverence that form the series Landscapes where I live (here and there). Even in places where wild and human interpenetrate, I could sense the values of nature anywhere I looked with attention. The Coyote Creek Trail, the longest multi-use paved trail in San Jose, is surrounded by a narrow strip of public land. Although I considerably broadened my photography with the realization that it is a lived-in landscape, I initially approached photographing the trail through the idealization of nature landscape photography. The Trail will eventually be a black-and-white photography project, but at first I photographed with color in mind. Those images represent a glimpse at the project’s start. The last one is not what it appears to be, hinting at an unexpected direction the project took me to.

After I finished school and began working, I stopped checking non-fiction books from the library. Instead, I used my newly available funds to buy books. I could then physically mark salient words or passages while reading. This more active approach helps me retain the material better. I continue it to this day. I was going to simply copy the sentences I had marked while reading the essay, but realized that rewriting them would be more respectful of the copyright. The 2000-word summary below results from this process. I hope that it proves as thought-provoking to you than it was for me.

Summary of The Trouble with Wilderness; or, Getting Back to the Wrong Nature, by William Cronon

For countless Americans, wilderness represents the last sanctuary untouched by civilization’s relentless reach—a precious realm where the natural world endures in its purest form, essential to the survival of our planet. Yet, rather than existing apart from humanity, these lands are deeply shaped by human hands and values, born from distinct cultural moments and intentions that mark our history.

The wilderness we enter is far from a mere construct of our own. Recall the emotions stirred by moments in the wild, and you sense an undeniable presence of something wholly nonhuman, something profoundly beyond yourself. And yet, what led each of us to seek out these places, where such memories could take root, is entirely a product of human culture.

In the eighteenth century, wilderness evoked images of desolation—”deserted,” “savage,” “barren,” and ultimately “waste,” with associations far from favorable. It inspired emotions of “bewilderment” and fear, rooted deeply in biblical references. The wilderness was a place one entered reluctantly, often with a sense of dread. But by the late nineteenth century, this perception had shifted dramatically. The barren landscapes once considered devoid of value began to be seen as priceless treasures. When Thoreau proclaimed in 1862 that “Wildness is the preservation of the world,” he captured the essence of a profound transformation. By the early twentieth century, national attention turned to battles like that for Hetch Hetchy, where defenders decried the dam not as progress, but as a sacrilege—a violation of nature’s sanctity.

The roots of this remarkable shift can be traced to two main forces: the sublime and the frontier. The sublime, a profound cultural construct rooted in the Romantic movement, spans Europe and America, while the frontier embodies a uniquely American ideal. Together, these forces reshaped wilderness, embedding it with moral values and symbolic meanings that persist. The modern environmental movement is, in many ways, the inheritor of both Romantic ideals and a post-frontier worldview.

For wilderness to wield such profound influence, it had to embody the deepest values of the culture that revered it; it had to become sacred. This sense of the divine in wilderness existed even when it was considered a realm of spiritual peril—where if Satan roamed, so too might Christ. By the eighteenth century, this notion of wilderness as a supernatural threshold found form in the sublime. Thinkers like Edmund Burke, Immanuel Kant, and William Gilpin framed sublime landscapes as rare places to glimpse the divine, especially in vast, awe-inspiring terrains that stirred humility and reminded one of life’s fragility. The wonder Muir felt in Yosemite, Thoreau’s solemnity on Katahdin, and Wordsworth’s reverence in the Simplon Pass are different in tone but united in spirit, each man viewing the mountain as a cathedral. Their expressions of piety vary—Wordsworth’s bewildered awe, Thoreau’s austere solitude, Muir’s joyful ecstasy—but all share the same sacred sanctuary for their devotion.

The romantic sublime was not the only force that elevated wilderness to a sacred American ideal in the nineteenth century. Equally significant was the pull of primitivism—the belief that a simpler, more elemental way of life offered a remedy to the excesses of a refined and overly civilized society. In the United States, this idea crystallized in the national mythology of the frontier. As Frederick Jackson Turner described, easterners and European immigrants journeying to the unsettled frontier lands cast off civilization’s constraints, reawakened their primal energies, reinvented grassroots democratic institutions, and infused themselves with a vitality, independence, and inventiveness that defined American democracy and character. Wildlands became not only sites of spiritual renewal but also of national regeneration—the essential ground for understanding American identity. Yet the frontier myth carried an inherent acknowledgment of its impermanence. Within the narrative of the “vanishing frontier” lay the seeds of wilderness preservation. Safeguarding wilderness was, in a profound sense, a way to protect America’s most cherished origin myth.

A key element of the frontier myth was the conviction among some Americans that wilderness represented the final stronghold of rugged individualism. Paradoxically, the men who reaped the most from urban-industrial capitalism were often those most intent on escaping its stifling influence. For them, wilderness became the preferred landscape for elite tourism. Unlike rural people, who knew the demands of working the land, elite urban tourists and wealthy sportsmen brought their leisure-driven frontier fantasies into wild spaces, transforming wilderness into a reflection of their ideals.

The idea of wilderness as untouched, “virgin” land has always been painfully ironic from the perspective of Indigenous people who once inhabited those places. Displaced so that tourists might savor the illusion of an unspoiled America, these communities bore the burden of a manufactured wilderness experience. This forced removal underscores just how constructed the American concept of wilderness truly is. One of the clearest proofs of this invention is wilderness’s systematic erasure of its human history. In almost every form, wilderness represents a retreat from history itself.

The paradox of wilderness is that it subtly mirrors the values its admirers aim to escape. This retreat from history, nearly central to the wilderness ideal, offers the false hope of avoiding responsibility—a comforting illusion that we might erase our past and return to a pristine world untouched by human influence. Only those already distanced from the land could envision wilderness as an ideal for living in harmony with nature. The romantic wilderness ideal leaves no space for humans to make a livelihood from the land, embodying an ideology that ultimately excludes sustainable human presence.

Here lies the heart of the paradox: wilderness promotes a vision in which humanity is entirely separate from the natural world. If we insist that nature’s truest form must be wild, our presence becomes its undoing. As we live within an urban-industrial society yet imagine our true home lies in the wilderness, we subtly permit ourselves to sidestep accountability for our everyday lives. Through its escape from history, its alluring call to flee, and its reinforcement of a harmful dualism placing humans outside nature, wilderness presents a significant challenge to responsible environmentalism in modern times.

I hope it is now evident that my critique in this essay is not aimed at wild nature itself or even at the initiative to preserve large areas of wilderness. Rather, I question the specific ways of thinking that arise from this intricate cultural construct known as wilderness. The issue lies not with the landscapes we classify as wilderness—nonhuman nature and extensive natural areas certainly merit protection—but with the meanings we attach to that label. As biological diversity—and the wilderness itself—faces an uncertain future that demands careful and conscious management of the ecosystems supporting it, the wilderness ideology may stand in opposition to the very conservation efforts it advocates. Countries in the Third World grapple with significant environmental and social challenges that cannot be resolved through a cultural myth that urges us to “preserve” uninhabited landscapes, landscapes that have not existed in those regions for centuries.

In McKibben’s perspective, nature is dead, and we bear the responsibility for its demise. This view attributes a greater power to humanity than we truly possess; if nature is destined to perish because of our presence, then the only way to safeguard it would be to kill ourselves. By presenting wilderness as the ultimate hunter-gatherer antidote to civilization, Dave Foreman, the founder of Earth First!, perpetuates a stark yet familiar interpretation of the frontier primitivism myth. In this view, wilderness becomes the battleground for an epic conflict between destructive civilization and nurturing nature, rendering all other social, political, and moral issues insignificant in comparison. It is telling that these seemingly minor environmental problems disproportionately impact marginalized communities.

The dualism inherent in the concept of wilderness leads its proponents to frame its protection as a simplistic struggle between those who appreciate the nonhuman world and those who do not. This perspective risks overlooking critical distinctions among human communities and the complex cultural and historical contexts that shape varying views on wilderness. For instance, why is the “wilderness experience” frequently portrayed as a recreational pursuit primarily accessible to those with the class privileges that afford them the time and means to escape their jobs? Why does the preservation of wilderness often create a divide between urban outdoor enthusiasts and rural residents who depend on the land for their livelihoods? Moreover, why are “primitive” peoples romanticized in discussions about untouched natural areas, only to be dismissed when they engage in modern, human activities?

Romanticizing a distant wilderness often leads to neglecting the environment in which we truly reside—the landscape we inhabit, for better or worse. Many of our most pressing environmental challenges originate in our backyards, and addressing these issues requires an environmental ethic that informs us about responsible use of nature and conservation. The wilderness dualism frames any form of use as inherently abusive, which limits our ability to find a middle ground where responsible use and preservation can coexist in a balanced, sustainable manner.

My main concern with the concept of wilderness is that it can lead us to undervalue or even disdain the simpler, less celebrated places and experiences in nature. Without us fully recognizing it, wilderness often elevates certain aspects of the natural world while marginalizing others. By encouraging us to fetishize vast, awe-inspiring landscapes, these distinctly American notions of wilderness set an unrealistic benchmark for what we deem “natural,” making it easy to overlook the beauty and significance of the more ordinary environments that surround us.

One of the central tenets of my environmental ethic is the importance of recognizing that we are an integral part of the natural world, deeply connected to the ecological systems that support our lives. Any perspective that suggests a separation from nature—something wilderness often implies—can foster environmentally irresponsible behavior. At the same time, it is equally vital to acknowledge and respect nonhuman nature as a realm we did not create, possessing its own inherent, independent reasons for existence.

To bring the positive values we associate with wilderness closer to home, we must expand our understanding of the “otherness” that wilderness aims to define and protect. The myth of wilderness suggests that we can traverse nature without leaving a trace. However, living within history means we inevitably leave marks on a world that has already fallen. Our challenge lies in determining what kind of marks we choose to make. This is where our cultural narratives about wilderness are particularly significant. In the broadest sense, wilderness invites us to consider whether the Other must always yield to our desires and, if not, under what conditions it should be allowed to thrive without our interference.

The profound allure of the wild lies in the fact that wonder in its presence requires no effort; it simply overwhelms us. Wilderness becomes problematic only when we mistakenly believe that this sense of awe and otherness is confined to remote areas or relies on untouched landscapes far from our everyday lives. By recognizing the otherness in what feels unfamiliar, we can begin to appreciate it in what initially appears ordinary.

Our task is to move beyond rigid moral binaries— human versus nonhuman, natural versus unnatural, or fallen versus unfallen—that shape our understanding of the world. Instead, we should embrace a more nuanced continuum of natural landscapes that includes urban, suburban, pastoral, and wild spaces, each deserving of recognition and celebration without disparaging the others. We must honor the Other within our communities and the Other next door just as much as we cherish the distant, exotic Other.

Embracing a place as home inherently involves engaging with the nature present in it; there’s no escaping the need to manipulate, cultivate, or even harm certain aspects of nature to create our living spaces. However, if we recognize the autonomy and otherness of the beings and ecosystems around us—what our culture often labels as “wild”—we will be compelled to think more critically about how we interact with them and to question whether we should exploit them at all.

Tags: conservation, coyote creek, nature
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Autumn in New England

Posted on September 30, 2024, 7:08 pm, by QT Luong, under Recollections.

The first time I had flown somewhere just for the purpose of photography was when I traveled to New England in the fall of 1996. Beyond the pastoral scenes, the revelation of the fall foliage there turned out to be the starting point for my updated approaches to time and scale.

Back then, since arriving in California three years earlier, my photography had been limited to wilderness areas like national parks, and occasionally cities like San Francisco. The rural landscape in the Golden State is often dominated by industrial agriculture. Even family farms lack harmony with the land which I remember from the French countryside. Small towns are usually just scaled-down versions of larger modern towns. Before my 1996 autumn trip, I had been in Boston to visit MIT. Although I had noted its similarities with European cities, I had not set foot in the countryside of New England. Unlike in the West, many of the structures in rural Vermont date back to the 17th century. The countryside offered that cozy feeling of a long lived-in landscape. Villages nestled in valleys surrounded immaculate white steepled churches. Centuries-old farms and red barns dotted rolling hills and meadows. It was a perfectly picturesque pastoral landscape.

The locations I visited offered perfect compositions of rural New England scenes because I relied on a photography guidebook that listed 23 iconic “photo scenics” selected for that reason. Yet, I seldom encountered other photographers at those well-known locations, except for one early morning at the Jenne Farm. Seeing a dozen tripods was unusual enough to compel me to take several pictures of their lineup. As far as I can tell, the photographers were respectful, staying at a distance from the farm and close to the road. In recent years, social media has brought so many unruly visitors to Jenne Farm – some of them breaking into buildings to use restrooms – that the entire area had to be closed to non-residents during October. Authored by local photographer Arnold Kaplan, the modest self-published, 72-page stapled booklet did not include any photographs. Instead, it featured hand-drawn maps of each site with recommended tripod locations marked. Some may shun such an approach, but at that time it felt right for me, as I viewed myself as a travel photographer. For many years I continued to use guidebooks in new locations when looking for travel images. I found value in having a pre-selected list of places that have proved productive for others, knowing that once I am there, I am free to look for my compositions before comparing them with a reference, an instructive exercise.

The main motivation for my trip was to check out the renowned New England fall foliage. In most places in the U.S. West, the main contributors to fall color are aspens, cottonwoods, or oak trees. When autumn arrives, the color turns to various shades of yellow. The East’s plentiful maple trees add brilliant hues of oranges and reds, transforming the landscape into a vibrant palette of color if you are there at the right time. Nowadays, many websites track the progression of fall color. Still, finding the perfect window is not easy since conditions can vary from valley to valley and changes can occur overnight. For instance, between the two mornings I visited Jenne Farm, the change in foliage had progressed noticeably. With my usual luck, the best light and foliage did not coincide. The peak of fall color in Vermont can occur anytime between late September and mid-October, depending on the year. However, before the peak the abundance of greens provides some additional color contrast, whereas after the peak clusters of colored leaves no longer obscure the arboreal structures of the trunks and branches, enlivening their stark beauty.

I was astonished by the New England fall foliage. It was unlike anything I had seen before. Combine that with the attraction of fewer visitors, cooler temperatures, more dynamic weather, and reasonable daylight lengths, and you can see how I became so fond of autumn. I made a goal to visit each of the national parks during that season (see guide to fall foliage in the national parks). The power of the fall foliage displays in New England is such that it forced me to feel wonderment about the changes in nature. Since then, even when standing in places where that change is much more subtle, I have learned to experience some of that wonder by looking carefully. This appreciation of change is why I planned my national park travels the way I did, with several shorter visits rather than one extended stay. One single long visit is more relaxing, logistically easier, and reduces the environmental impact. However, multiple visits make it possible to see the parks in different seasons and with more variation in weather. In hindsight, the richer observations and experiences made the compromise worth it.

I had long admired the photography of Eliot Porter (see my survey of his books). In 1991, Nature’s Chaos was the first nature photography book I bought. Porter coined the expression “intimate landscapes” and his artistic practice is almost entirely focused on them. However, it is the awe-inspiring power of mountains that inspired me to start photography. In the West, as I found plenty of spectacular scenery all new to me, my first instinct was to convey a sense of their sublimity. On this New England trip, when it came time to turn the lens towards the natural world instead of depicting man’s imprint in pastoral scenes, I quickly grasped that the eroded mountains were no match for the Sierra Nevada. On the other hand, the intricate beauty of fall foliage was new to me. I realized that more intimate compositions may be better at conveying their beauty. I started to look for smaller scenes instead of grand landscapes. Photographers like Porter, John Wawrzonek, and William Neill made their photography look effortless. However, upon trying my hand at it, I realized that finding a great composition of something as simple as tree trunks with harmonious foliage is not as easy as it seems. Such scenes may appear routine, but it takes a lot of looking to discover a satisfying photograph. Working in large format, I shot sparely out of necessity. At the beginning of the trip, it was common not to find a single nature photograph during an entire day. However, by the end, my vision for those had improved.

It probably helped that I finished my trip in Acadia National Park because due to the coastal influence and elevation, the fall foliage peaks later there than in the mountains of Vermont and New Hampshire. Being in a national park surrounds you with pristine – or pristine-looking – nature removed from the distractions of human development. Their power is that being there is enough for us to feel wonder. With efforts solely directed towards nature scenes, I made progress. Being used to the expansive scenery of the West, I was surprised to find that Acadia National Park packed such a great variety of scenery into such a small and easily accessible area: woods, coastline, lakes, and mountains. A significant extension of the National Park system in 1919, Acadia National Park was the first national park established in the East for a good reason: it is the crown jewel of the East Coast. I was lucky it was also the first national park I visited outside the West. The visit served to highlight the diversity of the parks and to reinforce my determination to photograph all of them, but now paying more attention to seasons and smaller scenes.

Tags: autumn, culture, forests, nature, photography
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Twelve More Black and White Landscape Photography Books

Posted on September 13, 2024, 2:14 pm, by QT Luong, under Books.

In the second installment of my selection of favorite black-and-white landscape photography books, we are moving up a bit in time compared to the first list, which did not include any living photographer. At sixty, I am no spring chicken, however all the photographers on this list are my seniors. Some are quite active in making new pictures or publishing new books. A key to longevity is to keep a life-long passion. Since there is always something left to learn and master in its art and craft, photography is not a bad choice.

Although the photographers on this list are alive, with maybe an exception, I wouldn’t generally call them contemporary. The next installment will clarify that. Shot on film, mostly with large-format cameras, and otherwise medium format, their work is deeply rooted in a tradition of fine craftsmanship where technical mastery and print quality reinforce the beauty of the subjects. They are not limited to the natural world. Still, few artifacts of modern civilization are present in their exploration of place and landscape. The books often convey a sense of timelessness through the enduring nature of their subjects and frequently explore spiritual themes. They are all from my collection – the vast majority signed or inscribed – and like in the previous installment, I have carefully paired them to highlight common themes and contrasts.

Paul Caponigro: The Wise Silence (1984)

Distinguished by a deeply spiritual and mystical approach, Paul Caponigro (born 1932) is one of America’s foremost landscape photographers. The Wise Silence is the best survey of his work. The images stand out through their ability to transcend literal representation, capturing the inner essence and metaphysical qualities of the subjects. An apple is transformed into a galaxy. Featuring landscapes, close-ups, ancient English stone monoliths, and Japanese shrines, they evoke a sense of timelessness and reverence. While reducing their brilliance, the printing on matte paper complements the contemplative and timeless nature of Caponigro’s work, inviting viewers into a meditative experience that reveals through transformative images the hidden beauty and deeper energies of the world.

John Sexton: Quiet Light (1990)

John Sexton (born 1953), a former assistant to Ansel Adams, continues his mentor’s meticulous attention to light and shadow through the mastery of the photographic process, frequently working in similar locations such as Yosemite and the California central coast. However, instead of emphasizing the grandeur and dramatic beauty of nature in bold compositions, Sexton focuses on its intimate details and its peaceful, contemplative moments. The book’s title refers to the pre-sunrise and post-sunset light the photographer favors to create soft and subtle photographs. With a focus on light and form, his images capture the quiet, often overlooked beauty in the natural world.

Bruce Barnbaum: Tone Poems (2001)

Despite his storied fifty-year career, Bruce Barnbaum (born 1943) still considers photography his hobby. His classic first book, Visual Symphony (1986), though renowned for its pioneering exploration of slot canyons – where his training in physics led him to see an electro-magnetic force field – also encompassed a diverse range of architectural and natural subjects in its four movements. Tone Poems broadens the scope. The two books are divided into six opuses, each a deep exploration of the dynamic interplay between forms and the dynamics found in both nature and the works of man, infusing his work with a sense of musicality and abstraction that invite introspection and engagement. The pairing of these opuses with carefully selected classical piano pieces enhances their emotional resonance, creating a multisensory journey that invites the viewer to “hear” the visual rhythms and “see” the music. The third book wasn’t published, but Barnbaum just released Discoveries of a Lifetime which he considers his Magnum Opus.

Huntington Witherill: Orchestrating Icons (2000)

Huntington Witherill (born 1949), after entering college as a music major to become a concert pianist started in 1970 a career in fine art photography characterized by a wide range of inanimate subjects and approaches. Yet, it is the classic western American landscape, as featured in Orchestrating Icons together with a few eastern waterfalls, that attracted him to photography. Focusing on the elegance of form, the refinement of composition, exquisitely varied tonality, and the precise orchestration of visual elements, he creates images that are precise, harmonious, and visually striking. The book sequences them with ebbs and flows reminiscent of a musical composition.

Roman Loranc: Two-hearted Oak (2003)

Roman Loranc (born 1956) emigrated from Poland but came to prominence with this tribute to the little-heralded landscapes of California’s Central Valley. Two-hearted Oak stands out for Loranc’s deep emotional connection to an overlooked land. His work is characterized by its intimate exploration of nature’s quiet and moody beauty. Often featuring fog-shrouded scenes that evoke a sense of mystery and timelessness, the split-toned photographs are imbued with a lyrical quality and a refined aesthetic. The titular oak, a recurring subject in his work, symbolizes resilience and endurance, embodying the spirit of the landscape itself.

Beth Moon: Ancient Trees (2014)

Beth Moon (born 1956) ventured to almost every continent for fourteen years, seeking out some of the largest, rarest, and oldest trees on Earth. Her signature use of the platinum/palladium printing process ensures that her images possess a depth and richness that reveal the intricate detail and enduring presence of the trees themselves, with the prints mirroring the longevity of her subjects. The result of this epic approach to nature is maybe the finest collection of tree portraits, and by far the best-selling title on this list. Including some of the strangest and most magnificent specimens, it emphasizes the timeless quality of nature’s most ancient forms.

Michael Kenna: Hokkaido (2006)

Michael Kenna (born 1953) has over ninety books and catalogs published. Mainly a landscape photographer working day and night in pastoral and urban spaces, his work is concerned with the interaction between the natural landscape and human-made structures. His unmistakably distinctive images, most often made in a square format and elaborately printed at a modest size identically reproduced in books, are atmospheric, peaceful, and minimalistic. His vision of simplicity reached a new level after he began to work in Japan, culminating in his winter travels to the northern island of Hokkaido, where he captured the ethereal beauty of snow-covered fields, solitary trees, and misty horizons. The frequent use of long exposures adds a contemplative and dreamlike quality to the images. Hokkaido is not a documentation of a place but rather a meditation on solitude, silence, and the quiet power of nature. Maple boards and textured Japanese paper make Hokkaido an uncommon art object, like Japan (2003), but those distinctively produced books can be expensive on the used market. As a more common book presentation of the work, I suggest Forms of Japan (2015).

Lee Friedlander – Western Landscapes (2016)

In a career spanning six decades and over fifty books, Lee Friedlander (born 1934), one of the most eminent living photographers, has produced an unrivaled output touching almost every subject matter, well beyond his extensive depiction of America’s “social landscape”, a term he coined, and of its inhabitants. Even more remarkable is that he has made a distinctive mark on almost every genre of photography, from self-portraiture and nudes to street photography. This equally distinctive body of work dates from the 1990s and early 2000s. Despite being often photographed in iconic national parks, Western Landscapes radically departs from the romanticized American landscape photography tradition by seeing the grandeur of the American West through a raw vision of realism, distortion, and complexity. Working quickly using a Hasselblad Superwide and flash at midday, his idiosyncratic, rule-breaking landscapes fill up the square format by fusing intricate foreground detail and vast backgrounds into chaotic, dense, and layered compositions. The relatively classical cover image doesn’t represent that he made many of the images from unconventional vantage points obscured by tangles. The 14×15″ book trim, largest of any on this list, is appropriate for the monumentality of the landscapes and the overload of visual information in the images.

Clyde Butcher: The Everglades (2020)

Despite having photographed landscapes internationally, Clyde Butcher (born 1942) will always be remembered for his life work in the Everglades. His Everglades photographs have been published in smaller volumes before. Nevertheless, with its large trim and extensive selection, this long-awaited self-published book is the first to do justice to his 36 years of pioneering Everglades photography. After being introduced to the swamp’s beauty, Butcher made his home there, when the Everglades were not recognized as a subject for landscape photography. Carrying an environmental message, the book is organized by ecosystems, emphasizing the overlooked diversity of this natural wonder. The photographs highlight the timelessness of its ancient, primal beauty. Butcher, known for his use of ultra-large format cameras and mural-sized prints of the American natural landscape, brings an unparalleled level of detail and grandeur to his images, allowing viewers to fully appreciate the vastness, intricate beauty, and ecological importance of this wild and fragile environment.

Kenro Izu: A Thirty-Year Retrospective (2010)

Kenro Izu’s (born 1949) work includes floral and nude still-life work in the studio. However, this retrospective is focused on his most sustained project, which explores the spiritual and historical significance of sacred sites in over 30 countries, with also a dozen portraits. The quiet photographs evoke a sense of reverence and contemplation for ancient structures and landscapes that have endured through centuries. Known for his meticulous craftsmanship, Izu has been using since 1983 a large format camera producing 14”x20” negatives. The great beauty of the resulting platinum-palladium prints fully expresses the stillness and timelessness of the world’s sacred places.

Martha Casanave: Explorations Along an Imaginary Coastline (2006)

Martha Casanave (born 1946) photographs mostly people, which is why she included a small mysterious figure with a bowl hat in Explorations Along an Imaginary Coastline. The dreamy and surreal images, all created near her home on the Monterey Peninsula, combine a strong sense of place with an uncommon vision, aided by a pinhole camera that produces images with infinite depth of field and very blurred waters. The coastline is not just a physical setting. It serves as a symbolic landscape, where the lines between real and imagined are obscured, the familiar and the fantastical blended, creating a narrative that explores place, identity, and the mysteries of the subconscious.

Geir Jordahl: Searching for True North (2007)

Geir Jordahl (born 1957) pushes the limits of human perception through unconventional formats while probing the spiritual significance of the places he visits. The images in Searching for True North were made with a Widelux panoramic camera meant for wide horizontal subjects, but all the photographs in the book are vertical. Likewise, most of the images were photographed with infrared film, which reverses expected tones. The presentation beyond what is in front of our eyes is exemplified by the otherworldly cover image from Canyonlands National Park, where the daytime sky appears filled with stars and contrails. Those technical choices transform real and sometimes well-worn places into metaphorical landscapes. Jordahl’s work is not just a visual journey spanning 30 years of travels around the world, but a philosophical one, making this book a quest for understanding of self and place in the world. He continues his explorations with The Endless Sphere of Time, a new book of spherical photographs.

If you have any favorites that fit within the parameters of this list, please mention them in the comments!

Tags: masters, photography book lists, reviews
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Tracing the History of National Park Service Emblems through Visitor Guides

Posted on August 25, 2024, 10:10 am, by QT Luong, under Books.

On the 108th anniversary of the National Park Service (NPS) this article continues my examination of the official NPS visitor guides over the years, focussing this time on one particular element: the NPS emblem. If you haven’t done so, reading the previous installments of this series will provide context.

Part 4 of an on-going series: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | to be continued

Although nowadays the NPS Arrowhead is one of the most recognized and beloved emblems in the U.S., it wasn’t until this century that its use became entirely consistent. It is difficult to trace its appearances on signage and uniforms because little of the outdated versions remain. However, it is still possible to find copies of NPS visitor guides dating from more than a century ago. A close look at them makes it possible to chronicle the history and evolution of the emblems used by the NPS.

1917-1951: DOI emblems

The U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) was created in 1849. Starting with Yellowstone National Park in 1872, all the national parks have been under the responsibility of the DOI. The National Park Service (NPS) was created in August 25, 2016 as a federal agency within the DOI with the sole mission to manage the national parks. In the years prior to 1916, the visitor guides issued by the DOI for some of those parks did not feature an emblem anywhere. Since there was yet no agency within the DOI responsible for the national parks, they were credited to the “Office of the Secretary”.

1913 and 1915 visitor guide booklets for Mt Rainier National Park

The year of its creation, in 1916, the NPS received its first emblem, a routine eagle perched on a rock with its winds spread wide. As reported in the National Park Portfolio examination, that emblem seems to have appeared in print only in the year 1916, and not on park visitor guides. In 1919, a new NPS emblem consisting of a sequoia cone emerged, as chronicled in Harper’s Ferry Center’s (HFC) article Planting a Seed. Some thought that it didn’t fully represent the scope of the NPS mission. Although it was used on signage and uniforms, its appearance in print was limited to internal NPS newsletters – explicitly marked “Not For Publication”. For the sake of completness, I have shown the two little-used emblems in the bottom left of the opening picture. For its first thirty-six years, the NPS used in its publications the emblem of its parent agency, the U.S. Department of the Interior, rather than its own emblem.

The DOI received its first official seal, an eagle clutching arrows perching on a sheaf of wheat during its first year in 1849. Sometimes in 1917, that trite federal eagle was replaced with a distinctive bison which better symbolized the Department’s western focus. However, the first national park visitor guides issued by the NPS were printed ahead of the season 1917, before the change to the bison. Unlike those that came before, they credited to “Department of the Interior – National Park Service”. There was a booklet each for Yellowstone, Yosemite, Sequoia and General Grant, Mount Rainier, Crater Lake, Wind Cave, Mesa Verde, Glacier, Rocky Mountain National Parks plus the Hot Springs Reservation. The old emblem of the DOI adorned their cover.

1917 visitor guide booklets.

The bison appeared on the covers for Wind Cave National Park and Hot Springs Reservation in 1920. From the years 1921 to 1929, no emblem appeared on the visitor guides, so we cannot see there that between 1923 and 1929, another eagle had replaced the bison, which was restored in 1930 (source). That year, the new emblem of the DOI with the bison adorned a few covers – the others were probably printed in 1929. In 1931, it was reproduced on all the covers except Crater Lake National Park. In 1932, it was removed from the covers of the Glacier and Zion National Parks booklets but stayed on the others. Novelty seems to have been a factor in its prominent placement.

Visitor guide booklets “Circular of General Information regarding Yellowstone National Park” from 1928 to 1931. Notice the caption “The New 2028 Geyser” in 1929 and “The Imperial Geyser” in 1920.

Complete set of visitor guide booklets for 1931.

In the standardized booklet designs from 1933 to 1942, the DOI emblem was removed from all the covers (shown here) but was dutifully featured on the first inside page of each visitor guide. In the previous installment, I noted that in the 1940s, some parks replaced the standard booklet format with a folding brochure format. This started with the newly established Great Smoky Mountains National Park in 1940. In 1941, Yellowstone National Park and the newly established Mammoth Cave followed. In 1942, four more national parks (Sequoia & Kings Canyon, Glacier, Rocky Mountain, and Lassen Volcanic National Parks) made the change. In 1945, a year when very few new visitor guides were issued, Isle Royale National Park joined them. In this new standardized format, the DOI emblem reappeared on the cover.

Visitor guide folding brochures from the early 1940s.

Past World War II, when no uniform design standards were in use, visitor guides no longer featured the DOI emblem on their covers, except Sequoia & Kings Canyon, Shenandoah, Great Smoky Mountains, and Everglades National Parks where it lingered until 1956. Compared to the previous years, the latest emblem which appeared in 1950 added letters with the founding date of the department, March 3, 1849. There were also differences in the way the bison was drawn. However, by the late 1940s, the NPS had been seeking its own emblem, holding a contest in 1949 that resulted in a winner but no adoption.

Shenandoah National Park folding brochures, 1949 and 1950.

Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks folding brochures, 1947 and 1951.

DOI emblems from visitor guides: 1931 (Yellowstone National Park), 1949 and 1950 (Shenandoah National Park), 1951 (Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks).

1952-1968: Monochromatic Arrowhead

It wasn’t until 1962 that the DOI officially approved a new official symbol for the NPS, the first iteration of the beloved arrowhead. An article in the internal NPS newsletter National Park Courier (June 7, 1962) officially spelled out its meaning:

The arrowhead “trademark” symbolizes the scenic beauty and historical heritage of our Nation. The history and prehistory of the United States is recognized in the arrowhead shape of the shield. A tall tree in the foreground implied vast forested lands and growing life of the wilderness. The small lake on the shield is a reminder of the role of water in scenic and recreational resources. Behind the tree and lake towers a snow-capped mountain typifying open space and the majesty of nature. Near the point of the arrowhead is an American bison as the symbol of the conservation of wildlife.

Arrowheads from Glacier National Park visitor guides: 1952, 1953

That symbol had been extensively used for a decade after being approved on July 20, 1951. The history of the arrowhead design has been imprecise, with much of the confusion originating from the NPS and repeated in many places. For instance, the page History of the Arrowhead (which is quoted by Google in response to the search “first NPS arrowhead”) names Aubrey Neasham, Herbert Maier, and NPS director Conrad Wirth as the people responsible for the arrowhead design. It mentions the 1952 Oregon Caves National Monument visitor guide as the first appearance of the arrowhead in print – with the standard (for the B&W era) black elements on a light background. If you want to read all the historical details, the HFC’s article A Germ of an Idea sets the record straight: Walter Rivers was the designer of the NPS arrowhead emblem, and the initial design had grey elements over a black background, as can be seen in the following brochure covers.

First column: Yosemite, Crater Lake, Glacier National Parks visitor guides from 1951, 1952, and 1953. Fourth column: 1954 (Yosemite), 1958 (Crater Lake), 1956 (Glacier).

The following year, 1953 saw a wider adoption of the new standard arrowhead with black elements on a light background, often on the brochure cover and almost always on its first or last interior page. However, this adoption was not universal. Glacier National Park was a curious exception in using the initial Arrowhead with a black background from 1956 to 1959. By 1960, with the exception of Lassen Volcanic National Park, all park visitor guides had removed the Arrowhead from the cover, printing it instead on the last page. Again, novelty seems to have been a factor in its prominent placement.

Front and back covers of Acadia National Park (1962) and Sequoia & Kings Canyon National Park (1959) stapled brochures.

1968-1969: Parkscape U.S.A.

In 1966, as the NPS celebrated its 50th anniversary, the park infrastructure was in its best shape thanks to aptly named Mission 66, a decade-long construction program initiated by Director Conrad Wirth in 1956 – notice the paragraph about Mission 66 on the brochures above. However, during that decade park visitation had also more than doubled because of the growing urbanized population with more leisure time. George Hartzog, the new NPS director, conceived of a new program to meet this challenge and get the National Park System ready for the centennial of Yellowstone National Park’s establishment in 1972. The name “Parkscape U.S.A.” was coined to “articulate the growing concern around the world for the protection of natural and historical environments.”

Thomas Geismar of the New York design firm Chermayeff and Geismar Associates created the symbol for Parkscape U.S.A., a bold and modern abstraction representing the interconnectivity needed to protect people and the environment. In the words of Hartzog:

the symbol represents the three categories of parks—natural, historical, and recreational—that make up the work of the National Park Service. The fact that the design implies, as has been suggested, mountains, or fortifications, or tents, comes as a bonus to our original hopes for a new symbol to identify our new program.

The symbol for Parkscape U.S.A. launched in 1966 and was featured on a US Postal Service anniversary stamp printed 117 million copies. More details about the Parkscape U.S.A. program and symbol can be found in HFC’s article Design for the Times.

Parkscape U.S.A. First Day Covers

DOI seal and NPS badge, 1968-1969

Initially, the Parkscape symbol was intended to appear only in places relevant to the Parkscape U.S.A. program and not to replace the Arrowhead. However, as part of a drive by President Nixon to modernize the government, the DOI adopted a new abstract and angular emblem without the bison, also designed by Geismar to represent the department’s diverse responsibilities. Can you recognize a stylized pair of hands framing symbols of the sun, mountains, and water? Feeling that the Arrowhead with the bison was rendered anachronistic by the new DOI emblem, Hartzog initiated the change of the NPS official emblem to the Parkscape symbol, which became effective on Oct 10, 1968. This coincided with the NPS adopting the new “pocket guide” design standard for its visitor guides, which was as radical a departure from tradition as any before – for a presentation of the “pocket guides”, please refer to the three previous installments of this series. It was fitting that the Parkscape symbol appeared mostly on the “pocket guides” (although not on all) as the new design-oriented folders shared with the Parkscape U.S.A. symbol a modern minimalist approach.

Back of “pocket guides” from 1967-1969 with the Parkscape symbol.

Even for the minority of parks that did not follow the “pocket guide” design standards, some visitor guides now featured the Parkscape symbol since it had become the official NPS symbol.

Theodore Roosevelt National Memorial Park (1969), Haleakala National Park (1967), Wind Cave National Park (1968) folding brochures with the Parkscape symbol. The Haleakala brochure marks the last time the NPS used the DOI emblem.

Although the design community widely praised the Parkscape symbol, NPS employees felt its novelty assaulted traditions and sentiments. Faced with resistance to change and nostalgia for the Arrowhead among the rank, Hartzog appointed a committee. After it issued a recommendation to reinstate the Arrowhead as the official emblem, he approved the suggestion on May 15, 1969. The Parkscape U.S.A. symbol reign as NPS emblem had lasted less than a year. The new DOI emblem occurred a similar fate.

As a result of this short period, most of the “pocket guides” do not feature the Parkscape symbol. They also did not feature the Arrowhead, maybe because its design was inconsistent with their modern design, or because after the turmoil, the NPS thought it better not to print any emblem on the visitor guides. Unlike from 1930 to 1968, from 1970 to 1998 none of the park brochures included the NPS Arrowhead or the DOI seal inside.

1999-present: Color Arrowhead

When it was used in visitor guides in the years 1952-1968, the Arrowhead was printed monochromatically, because that’s how the visitor guides were printed until the mid-1970s. However, when it was used as a badge for park ranger uniforms, since the 1950s, the Arrowhead featured colors.

In 1999, an Arrowhead measuring 3/4 inch (2.4 cm) was added to the black band of some Unigrid brochures – Everglades, Kenai Fjords, Saguaro, Zion National Parks. 15 other national parks followed suit in 2000, and 13 more in 2001. Since Unigrids are printed full-color, it was natural that the Arrowhead would appear in color. Like the uniform badges, it featured a dark green for the trees and a brown background. The mountain snowfield, bison, and letters, including “Department of the Interior”, were white. Earlier Unigrid brochures, distinguished by larger fonts for the park name and subsequently the subtitle “Official Map and Guide” did not feature the Arrowhead. Note also the change in fonts from Helvetica to Frutiger.

Everglades National Park Unigrid brochures: 1979-1990 (large name font), 1992-1998 (Official Map and Guide), 1999-2000 (large Arrowhead), 2003, 2004-2014, 2015-present.

In 2001, Director Order #52A: Communicating the National Park Service Mission, established a clear communications strategy for the NPS. As part of it, Harpers Ferry Center was put in charge of NPS graphic design standards, and the last iteration of the Arrowhead took place. The Dennis Konetzka Design Group refined it to appear consistently and legibly on all NPS communication materials with modern printing. The colors were standardized to Pantone colors Dark Rust PMS 1615C for the mountain, Medium Rust PMS 1605C for the sky which previously was the same color as the mountain, and Dark Green PMS 553C for trees and grass – the bison is now standing in a large field of grass rather than a tiny patch. White is used for the bison, lake, snowfield, and type, which now excludes the letters “Department of the Interior”. The color graphic design is made available by the HFC in two versions, as flat artwork with plain colors, and as shaded artwork for print applications that can reproduce fine details – such as the Unigrid brochures. On that page, the Arrowhead is watermarked with the letters NPS because patent, trademark, and federal laws strictly prohibit its reproduction without NPS permission.

Arrowheads from Glacier National Park Unigrid brochures: 2000, 2001.

Unlike visitor guides of some earlier periods, Unigrids were not redesigned every year, but rather based on demand. Glacier and Rocky Mountain National Parks are among the oldest and most visited in the system. Their Unigrid brochures, redesigned in 2001, feature the new 2001 Arrowhead, printed almost the same size as previously.

Glacier National Park Unigrid brochures: 2000, 2001-2005, 2008-2018.

Rocky Mountain National Park Unigrid brochures: 2000-2001, 2001-2005, 2006-2012.

The use of emblems in visitor guides had been inconsistent because, before 2001, there was no requirement to include them. The 2001 Director Order #52A dictated that:

the Arrowhead Symbol will appear on all official NPS media intended for the public, consistent with the graphic design standards prescribed by Director’s Order #52B (see section III.E, below). It will be used in all new publications immediately, and will be applied to all existing publications as they are updated.

By 2003, a new design standard took effect, prescribing a noticeably reduced Arrowhead size of 5/8 inch (1.5cm). For the lesser-visited parks, brochures either with the previous version of the Arrowhead or with no Arrowhead sometimes persisted for years. By 2012, when the National Park of American Samoa brochure adopted the current design standard, all the Unigrids brochures featured the same 2001 Arrowhead. This was the first time in history when all the NPS visitor guides featured a uniform design down to minute details, and since then the NPS has managed to keep it that way.

PS: I am still expanding my collection and I have numerous duplicates, so if you’d be interested in donating, trading, selling, or buying vintage brochures for any NPS units that are currently national parks, please let me know.

Part 4 of an on-going series: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | to be continued

Tags: history of the national park service, national parks
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Under-Over Water Split Shots: Challenges and Solutions

Posted on August 7, 2024, 11:26 am, by QT Luong, under Techniques.

http://www.terragalleria.com/blog/under-over-water-split-shots-challenges-and-solutions

Under-over split shots are some of the most technically difficult photographs I have attempted. In this piece, I review the challenges and solutions behind my latest attempt on Ofu Island in American Samoa, including even an instructive experiment with AI. If you are curious about everything that goes on behind those types of photographs or are thinking of trying your own, read on!

Under/over water split images capture the underwater and above-water scenes in a single frame, almost always with a super-wide angle lens. They offer a unique perspective, showcasing the contrast and connection between the aquatic world below and the terrestrial world above. One of the main goals of my trip to Ofu Island was to make such photographs including the reef, which is more demanding than a split image with a shallow sandy bottom where you can stand or sit.

If you have not tried to take photos underwater, it is difficult to appreciate how difficult that is. You are swimming or diving and have to prioritize staying alive. Using underwater camera housings adds complexity, while setting the correct exposure and focus is more intricate due to the unique lighting and refractive properties of water. The constant motion from water currents and waves makes maintaining stability difficult. Visibility is often compromised by particles and sediment. Making a split shot combines the requirements of underwater photography with those of landscape photography. Both the underwater and topside parts of the image need to be interesting, well-exposed, and in focus.

In addition, one has to position the waterline separating the underwater and overwater parts, which is a key to the composition. Placing it roughly in the middle of the image doesn’t present a difficulty in flat water. However, even in a relatively calm lagoon, small waves transform that placement into a serious challenge. The smaller the front element of the lens, the more difficult it is to capture an adequately positioned waterline.

Left: Nikonos V with 15mm lens; Right: Ikelite housing for Canon 5D2 with dome port for 17-40mm lens

During my 2002 visit to Ofu, my underwater camera was the storied Nikonos V. The last in a line of cameras originally designed by Jacques-Yves Cousteau, the Nikonos was the gold standard for 35mm amphibious cameras – that could be used on land or underwater without an additional waterproof housing. Besides being the underwater photography system of reference for decades, Nikonos cameras were also workhorse cameras for Vietnam War photographers. Moving to digital photography, I miss the bombproof construction, compactness (see picture above), ease of use, and extremely sharp optics. The front element of the lens was in direct contact with the water, producing images with a corner-to-corner sharpness and color rendition that is unmatched to this day by any camera placed in a housing. However, despite its versatility, the Nikonos was not the right tool for photographing split images. The front element of the 15mm lens was quite small, measuring about 2 inches. The film had to be advanced manually one frame at a time, which made capturing the waterline at the right position a low-yield endeavor.

This time, I came with a DSLR camera in waterproof housing. The cost of the housing, although a low-end Ikelite design, is roughly the same as the camera, and it fits only a specific model. For this reason, I was still using a Canon 5D Mark 2 with the 17-40mm lens. The front of the housing is called the port, and for wide-angle photography, it needs to be curved like a dome, hence it is a “dome port”. Ports are interchangeable as they have to be carefully matched to the lens. A larger port makes it easier to position the waterline and also leads to a thinner, cleaner image of it. With that respect, my 8-inch diameter dome port was certainly an improvement over the Nikonos. I still wished I had an even larger one for ease of waterline positioning and improved depth of field. Still, larger dome ports are massive, especially for travel, and too buoyant for underwater photography at any depth. Being designed for scuba diving, the Ikelite’s buoyancy is neutral, so when on the surface, the dome port is mostly submerged. To position the waterline in its middle, one needs to raise and hold the housing, which can be tiring since it weighs 14 lbs with the camera and lens. I remedied this situation by building a custom floater with a buoyancy calibrated by removing material from two swimming kickboards to place the waterline right at the middle of the dome port.

The waves were too unpredictable to foresee their movements, but with the DSLR, I could just keep shooting in bursts and hope for a good split. Jon Cornforth mentioned shooting a few thousand images in Ofu and deleting most of them. However, when a larger wave washes over the dome, it leaves droplets and water beads that ruin subsequent photos. Keeping the large surface of an 8-inch dome free of them was a new challenge. One can try to keep the dome dry after wiping it with a towel. With that in mind, I had brought two inflatables to experiment with. One can try to completely repel the water from the top of the dome by coating it with waxing products like clear car polish, Rain-X, or Jet-Dry (spot remover used in dishwashers). While this is said to work well with a glass dome, those products can damage acrylic domes. The alternative approach that I used is to create a thin, even film of water over the top of the dome, using Sea Drops Anti-Fog, or simple saliva. This is done in conjunction with dunking the dome quickly to get rid of droplets and swiftly pressing the shutter before beads can form. Reviewing the images on the back LCD, I thought that this technique worked well and that I also had a high success rate with the waterline placement.

In addition to those physical difficulties, there are also photographic technical challenges. The relatively easy ones are exposure and shutter speed. The underwater part of the image is darker than the part over water. A one-shot solution, preferable because of wave motion, is to use a graduated neutral density filter (GND), which has to be of the screw-on type because there is no space in a housing for a square filter holder. However, it limits the placement of the waterline and precludes switching from a horizontal to a vertical composition. Although to handle the difference some photographers use a 4-stop GND, I found that the dynamic range of digital cameras makes a 2-stop GND generally sufficient at midday. I brought an underwater strobe to light up the reef in lower illumination conditions, but it adds another level of complexity. Because while making the images you are floating in moving water, a fast shutter speed, at least 1/100s, although 1/200 is safer, is necessary. However, when shooting through a dome you also need to stop down the lens for uniform sharpness and depth of field (as explained next), hence even at midday, the range of usable ISO starts at 400.

The more difficult challenge is the depth of field. Above water, the dome port has no special optical properties; it works like a clear window. When used in a housing, the lens has air in front of it and air in front of the port, so there is no difference in the medium. However, underwater, the dynamics change. With air in front of the lens but water in front of the port, the dome port functions like the rear element of a giant lens made of the sea. Therefore, what the camera captures underwater is a virtual diffracted image. That is why objects appear closer underwater than above water. Roughly speaking, the virtual image is located at a distance from the lens equal to twice the dome’s diameter. For my 8-inch dome, it means that objects at infinity underwater are imaged about 16 inches from the lens, with the focusing distance for closer objects even shorter. Most people focus on the underwater part of the image, relying on depth of field to take care of the above-water part. However, even stopping down to the maximum may not be enough. When I examined larger versions of single-frame split images, I noticed that in single captures, the above-water portions were always slightly soft. Therefore, like Floris van Breugel, I planned to rely on focus bracketing and stitch two pictures taken at different focus settings. However, because of the current, I could not make the two frames from the same spot.

As told in my travel story, I flooded my housing and ruined the DSLR camera, destroying the hard-earned and promising pictures. Fortunately, I had brought two backup compact underwater cameras. My best one was the Sony RX100 in a Meikon housing with the screw-on Inon UWL-H100 wet lens that converts 28mm, the widest focal length of the RX100, to a 16mm suited for photographing split shots. Only slightly bulkier than the Nikonos, the combination provides maybe the best digital underwater image quality possible in a package of this small size, even though the limits of the 1-inch sensor begin to show up at ISO 400 – will someone make an underwater housing for the Ricoh GR? However, its front element is a smallish 3 inches, making placement of the waterline difficult. By using the focus bracketing technique, the best composition including the iconic Sunuitao Peak I was able to make is the photograph below, where the waterline is lower than I wished. It is a composite of two almost identical images, except for the focus point.

Recognizing the improbability of composing a great split image with that rig, I also proceeded to photograph a series of images with a neat waterline low in the frame, and a series of underwater images from a few inches below the surface, to be used as material for a composite image. Although the reef had an amazing diversity of corals, the most striking features were huge coral heads almost the size of a small car. If I framed the underwater image horizontally, the composite would have a square aspect ratio, so I preferred to frame the underwater vertically, resulting in a vertical composite with an overall higher resolution. Unlike the previous photograph, which I have kept close to the original file, I color-corrected the underwater part to restore some of the vibrance lost when the white balance is set for the landscape. Since they are an assemblage of different compositions unlike the composite images from focus bracketing, I clearly caption them with the word “composite”, an extreme rarity in my archive.

Generative AI is not part of my practice, however, I like to keep up to date with current technologies out of curiosity. To generate a horizontal image, I tried Adobe Firefly AI Image Extender in the Photoshop Beta release 25.10. As you click and drag beyond the borders of your image, generative AI quickly fills the space with contents that blend with the existing image. Although it took many iterations to give the mountain a plausible look, Adobe Firefly easily provided plausible renditions of the reef. I picked one that including coral species I remembered seeing in Ofu. With a final aspect ratio of 2:3, more than 55% of the image is AI-generated. I was impressed enough by the result that I even published one of those images, the first (partly) AI-generated image in my archive. I marked it as such in the caption. The opening image is one of the variations, and of course, the central portion is unchanged.

Since those AI images were so realistic, maybe it was unnecessary to travel to Ofu if the goal was just pictures, as you could try to generate 100% of the image by AI. OpenAI’s DALL-E 2 made a big splash as the first mainstream AI image generator and has been superseded by the more advanced DALL-E 3 offered as part of a ChatGPT Plus subscription ($20 per month as of this writing). There is a simple way to use it for free: it is the model that powers the lesser-known Microsoft Designer’s Image Creator. The first series was obtained with a direct prompt and the second with a ChatGPT-generated prompt, a bit of an improvement. I am no “prompt engineer”, so I am curious if anybody can do better. Those examples would indicate that AI still has a long way to go to produce an image from scratch even vaguely resembling a specific place – or even any place, as they all look quite artificial to my eye. It could be that Ofu Island is as much a challenge to AI image generators as it is to travelers. The scarcity of images available for training compared to well-trodden destinations must have been a factor, but that is what makes a visit to Ofu particularly rewarding.

Since this is still new, I am interested in your attitude towards generative AI. Have you created any AI-generated images, and would you publish them? If you do not see the two questions in the poll below, click here.

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Part 5 of 5: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Tags: AI, American Samoa, equipment, national park of american samoa, photography, technique, tropics, underwater
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American Samoa Cultural Vignettes

Posted on July 28, 2024, 8:26 pm, by QT Luong, under Locations.

https://www.terragalleria.com/blog/american-samoa-cultural-vignettes/

While this series has largely focused on natural experiences, the National Park of American Samoa was also established to preserve and celebrate Samoan culture. Its mission includes safeguarding cultural traditions and ensuring they remain vibrant and relevant. In that spirit, this piece showcases various aspects of Samoan culture through a collection of photos taken on Tuitula Island.

Aiga Busses

Aiga buses are a colorful and iconic mode of transportation in American Samoa. These vibrant, locally-owned buses are converted trucks, often adorned with bright paint, island motifs, and lively decorations. The buses operate on flexible schedules, picking up and dropping off passengers anywhere along their routes, making them a convenient and accessible option for locals and visitors alike. Fares are low, and the atmosphere is friendly and communal, reflecting the Samoan spirit of aiga, or family. Adding to the lively experience is the bus’s sound system, often blasting cheerful island music, creating a festive atmosphere.

Samoans

In American Samoa, locals are remarkably warm and friendly. As I also experienced in Vietnam, young people often invite visitors to take their pictures. This welcoming attitude contrasts sharply with the negative reactions sometimes encountered in Western countries, where parents often strongly object to their children being photographed. While those Samoans see photography as a way to connect and share their vibrant community, in mainland America, caution and suspicion often prevail.

Church

The Christian religion, practiced by almost every Samoan, holds significant importance in Samoan life, deeply influencing the culture and daily routines of its people. Even the smallest villages feature a distinctive church, serving as the spiritual and social heart of the community. The Sunday Sabbath is rigorously respected, with most activities paused to honor the day of rest and worship. Samoans often wear white to church. The strict observance of the evening prayer time, known as Sa, is a daily ritual where families gather to practice their devout faith. Retired scuba diving tanks are often used as curfew bells. Villagers hit them with hammers at 6 in the evening to signal the start of prayer time.

U.S. Territory

Throughout the 19th century, Western powers attempted to divide the Samoan Islands. In 1899, the US claimed the eastern islands, while Germany took the western ones. Flag Day commemorates the first raising of the American flag over American Samoa on April 17, 1900. With its new status, American Samoa adopted the U.S. flag. On Flag Day in 1960, the American Samoan flag, featuring both US and Samoan influences, became official. The red, white, and blue colors reflect US symbols. Today, American Samoans are U.S. nationals but not citizens, with some fearing that citizenship could disrupt their traditions.

Siapo

Siapo is a Samoan art made traditionally made from the inner bark of the paper mulberry tree. The bark is processed, beaten, and decorated with intricate patterns depicting natural elements like shells, fish, and leaves. Used in clothing, gifts, and wall hangings, siapo is created through a meticulous, multi-stage process passed down through generations. In 2002, a young Samoan man gave me a siapo as a gift after I observed him drawing it on wood and I returned the favor by sending him a print. Twenty-two years later, I posed at the National Park of American Samoa Visitor Center in front of an eight-foot by eight-foot Siapo Mamanu, the largest of its kind since 2000, created in collaboration with the American Samoa Community College Art Department on the occasion of the National Park Service Centennial.

Feast

Tisa’s Barefoot Bar weekly serves a traditional Samoan feast, prepared using an earth oven known as an umu. The preparation is a time-honored process. Early in the day, a patch of earth is lined with a sheet of metal, superheated stones, and banana leaves so that the food doesn’t touch the rocks. The food, which typically includes a variety of meats, seafood, and root vegetables, is then placed in the umu, sealed with layers of banana leaves, and left to cook slowly for several hours. This method infuses the dishes with a smoky flavor and tender texture, offering an authentic taste of Samoan cuisine. As a vegetarian, I was at first wary that I would only be served papaya and taro with a coconut and leaf garnish, but the food turned out surprisingly tasty and filling. The feast at Tisa’s Barefoot Bar, eaten without utensils, is not just a meal but a cultural experience, bringing people together to celebrate Samoan traditions and hospitality.

Part 4 of 5: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Tags: American Samoa, culture, travels
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The Ultimate Guide to Ofu Island, American Samoa

Posted on July 11, 2024, 5:44 pm, by QT Luong, under Locations.

https://www.terragalleria.com/blog/the-ultimate-guide-to-ofu-island-american-samoa

As the crown jewel of the National Park of American Samoa, Ofu Island is the tropical beach paradise many travelers dream about. However, there is little information about Ofu, most of it incomplete, outdated, or wrong. Based on insider information I acquired during two visits to Ofu, I remedy this situation and provide tips not found anywhere else for visiting Ofu.

1. Where is Ofu and why should I go?

Ofu Island is a remote island in the South Pacific, part of American Samoa. Few people would be able to even locate American Samoa on a map, so here you are, courtesy of the National Park Service (NPS):

American Samoa is a great place to visit if you like your destination out of the beaten path and unaffected by mass tourism, yet with the familiarity of a U.S. territory where English is an official language. With lush and dramatic mountains surrounded by beaches and coral reefs, the islands are rich in natural beauty. The friendly islanders perpetuate a distinctive Samoan culture. Despite all of this, my impression is that hardly anyone travels for leisure to American Samoa without an interest in visiting the National Park of American Samoa, often in a quest to visit all U.S. national parks. The park comprises three units, each located on a different island of American Samoa: Tuitula, Ta’u, and Ofu. The latter two are part of the group of Manu’a islands, sixty miles away from Tuituila, which is the main island of American Samoa.

All travelers who have visited the three units of the National Park of American Samoa agree that Ofu is the most beautiful and provides a much better experience than Tuitula, fulfilling imaginations of visiting a South Pacific beach paradise. If you thought Tuitula Island was lightly developed and slow moving, wait until the Manu’a Islands. On Ofu Island, you will feel immersed in the timeless South Pacific of old, where only a few cars per day disturb the natural beauty. About 60,000 live on Tuitula Island, but only about 150 on Ofu Island. With only a few hundred visitors there each year, you may have the world-class beach, one of the healthiest and most vibrant coral reefs anywhere with outstanding snorkeling, and great trail by yourself. A visit to Ofu is an unforgettable adventure and getaway.

2. When to go

By mainlanders’ standards, there is a perpetual summer weather in American Samoa. Since the islands are 14 degrees south of the equator, a tropical equatorial climate prevails with warm and humid weather year-round, and day and night temperatures ranging from 80°F to 90°F. That climate can feel a bit oppressive to mainlanders. The austral winter, May to October, is slightly cooler and drier, with fewer tropical storms although it may still rain every day. It is the most comfortable and safe period.

November to April is the rainy season and also cyclone season. Cyclones are the same thing as hurricanes and typhoons, the correct name depends on the part of the world where they originate from. On average, they happen about once per year. On the other hand, during that period, the trade winds also die down so there is little breeze to cool you down. The main positive is that the seas are often calmer.

3. How to get there

The reason why Ofu sees so few visitors is that getting there has been challenging. I will therefore provide plenty of details in this section. To reach Ofu, you have first to fly to Pago-Pago (PPG), which is the only international airport in American Samoa, a topic briefly discussed here. From there, the three options are: fly from Pago-Pago to Ofu, fly to Ta’u and ride a alia boat to Ofu, sail from Pago-Pago to Ofu with the cargo ship.

3.1 Flying to Ofu

As of this writing (July 2024), the first option is the clear and easy choice, but its availability was not always a given. Samoa Airways is the only commercial airline that currently flies to Ofu. Even when the flights were available, getting on them was a struggle because the airline website did not offer online bookings, emails were rarely replied to, and you needed luck to be able to speak with someone from their office by phone – in June 2024, I called them eight times without success. In 2002, I could book a flight only because spending an extended amount of days on Tuitula, I used word of mouth and interpersonal contacts, which is still the best way to get anything done in American Samoa. Since then, I’ve read of travelers having success with a local travel agency. The airline did not even take credit cards. Travelers such as this writer for AJC or my friend Tommy have found that the only way to get tickets in advance was to have them bought via Deb from Va’oto Lodge who has a friend working near their office. This changed on April 18, 2024, when Samoa Airways activated a new website, which now works like any normal airline reservation system, making it possible to book your flight online. Even though hopefully the days of difficult travel planning to Ofu may be over, travel itself is never a sure thing there. Bad weather will still cause a flight to be canceled. Even if the plane is on the way to the island, a tropical squall at landing time may cause it to turn around to Pago Pago. In the past, the plane was often broken down, and locals, particularly chiefs, sometimes prioritized over reservation holders. Given the lack of reliability of the flights, I strongly advise building flexibility. In particular, if you have an event that you don’t want to miss, such as your international flight out of Pago-Pago, you should not try to fly out of Ofu on the same day. An additional buffer day would be prudent.

When the schedule is followed, Samoa Airways flies twice per week from Pago-Pago to Ofu, on Tuesdays and Thursdays mornings. This gives the option to stay two or five days on Ofu. The latter would be my recommendation. If flying to Pago-Pago on Hawaiian Airlines, your itinerary would be: Pago-Pago on Monday, Ofu from Thursday to Tuesday, Honolulu on Wednesday or Thursday. Although Samoa Airways uses Pago-Pago International Airport, the procedures are similar to a general aviation flight: no call, TSA formalities, or seat assignments. The planes are Twin Otters with a pilot and co-pilot, seating 14 passengers. Each row has three seats, two on the right side and a single seat on the left side, separated by a narrow aisle. There are no overhead bins, so any carry-on luggage that doesn’t fit under a seat is stacked in the back of the cabin. The left side has the best views shortly after take off from Pago-Pago or Ofu. The flight takes an hour and 15 minutes and costs $155 each way. With all my gear, I was worried that the terms of carriage allowed only for one 5 kgs (11 lbs) piece of carry-on and one 15 kgs (33 lbs) piece of checked-in luggage. In practice, the agent makes you stand on a scale while holding your carry-on luggage, so if like me you have a lighter build, you will be fine even with heavy carry-on luggage. That fair practice that I wish was adopted by more airlines was probably inspired by Samoa Air, the first airline in the world to charge by weight of body plus luggage. For my overweight checked luggage, all I had to do was pay an extra $25. However, a Samoan person told me their baggage was not loaded because the airline had oversold the plane. Since that was in 2016, it meant no luggage for a week, as we’ll see next. Be sure to carry with you all the essentials! Here is Samoa Airways website.

3.2 Flying to Ta’u

When I visited Ofu in 2002, the convenient PPG-Tau-Ofu-PPG was a standard route. Nowadays, there are no flights between Ta’u and Ofu, so if you want to visit both islands by air, you need to fly PPG-Ofu-PPG and PPG-Tau-PPG. Since Ofu Island and Ta’u Island are only eight miles apart, it seems natural to try to cross from one island to the other by boat. For a while, this was the preferred option to reach Ofu, especially from 2009 to December 2014, when there were no flights to Ofu. As of June 2024, the National Park Service’s “Directions and Transportation” page still states incorrectly

Small planes serve park areas on Ta’u Island and the nearby nation of Samoa. Transportation to the other park area on Ofu Island is by local boat from Ta’u.

I’ll explain the reason for that situation so that you can appreciate the present-day status. Starting from 1987, Samoa Air (based in Pago-Pago) operated frequent flights to the Manu’a Islands. However, the owner sold the airline without disclosing that his Twin Engine Otters were nearing their inspection limits. The new owner couldn’t afford the expensive frame inspections, so he reduced the number of flights to extend the aircraft’s life. With fewer flights and less revenue, the leased aircraft were eventually forfeited, and Samoa Air went out of business in 2003. Subsequently, Inter Island Air picked up service to the Manu’a Islands. However, their Dornier 228-212 aircraft were not adapted to the short runway on Ofu. When for cost savings they replaced pilots contracted from a Las Vegas company with a team of young and inexperienced pilots, landing on Ofu became too much trouble and they discontinued service there. As the Ta’u airport (in Fitiuta) is much larger than the Ofu airport and Ta’u is the more populated of the Manu’a Islands, service to Ta’u continued until 2013, when an aircraft broke down. In 2014, Polynesian Air came to the rescue with four weekly flights to Ta’u and one weekly flight to Ofu, on Thursday. This made it necessary to stay in Ofu for a week unless you were willing to cross to Ta’u by boat, which many did. If you got the impression that air service was not very stable, it is because it was (and still is) a month-to-month operation. Polynesian Air, being based in Independent Samoa is a foreign flag carrier. Because of restrictions imposed on non-U.S.-flagged transport between U.S. destinations, they had to get special permission each month to operate in American Samoa. During the COVID pandemic travel to and within American Samoa was heavily limited, but when tourism resumed in 2022, Polynesian Airlines, now controversially renamed Samoa Airways, had switched the destination of the Tuesday flight from Ta’u to Ofu, so as of 2024 flights from PPG to Ta’u take place on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.

3.3 Riding a small boat (alia) between Ta’u and Ofu

For a decade, taking a local boat from Ta’u was the way to get to Ofu either because of lack of flights or time constraints. Those small boats, locally called alias, are mainly for fishing, with water taxi a secondary activity. As a result, there is no scheduled nor commercial inter-island service. It is about finding and making a deal with local fishermen to get a ride, possibly by just showing up at the pier. Making a reservation can be challenging unless a Samoan person such as your host serves as facilitator. The local travel agency was not able to secure a ride for us. Deb from Va’oto Lodge used to make such arrangements, but recently she declined to do so because she considered alia boats to be unreliable means of transportation and did not want to feel responsible. Reading traveler reports made hiring an alia boat seem routine, but for us it was a challenge. In retrospect, when Deb had mentioned fuel shortages or weather and ocean conditions, she perfectly anticipated the troubles we had. As alia boats are 18-foot vessels not that sea-worthy, if the swell is high, operators won’t risk venturing on the open ocean. The Samoan with whom we traveled had hoped to do the crossing on Friday, but like us was delayed until Wednesday. Despite his extensive connections, he struggled to get timely updates from the boat operator.

The rate is in the $100-$200 per person range, but we heard quotes as high as $400. Maybe because we traveled with a local, we were charged the lower end of the range. Payments are cash only. The Manu’a Islands are only 5 miles apart from each other. However, Ta’u Island is located southeast of Ofu Island, and the harbor on Ofu Island is on the northwest side of the island. If ocean conditions dictate a route north of Ofu Island, the boat has to ply 12.5 miles, which takes about an hour. In addition, the harbor is on the west side of Ta’u Island, the Fitiuta airport is on the east side, and there is no public transportation on Ta’u. I found the alia ride to be a fun experience, however, unless one has a very open schedule, I would not rely on it because nowadays there are other options.

3.4 Riding the cargo boat

The government operates a ferry/barge/cargo boat named MV Manu’atele. It travels every two weeks from Pago-Pago to the Manua Islands. While its primary function is to transport all the imported food and fuel supplies needed for the Manua Islands, it also has seating for 140 passengers. On the plus side, the ride costs only $30 each way, there is plenty of room onboard, and the sailings are not likely to be canceled because of the weather. The main drawback is that the crossing takes about eight hours, plus unloading time if its first stop is not your final destination. There are horror stories about the crossing but it would seem that they date from when it was serviced by the older and slower cargo ship MV Sili. The MV Manu’atele is a more recent boat put in service in 2017 which is said to provide comfortable, dry, and clean seating (no assigned seats) both below and above deck. The boat usually sails from Pago-Pago to Ta’u on Thursday and from Ofu to Pago-Pago on Friday, but this can vary and delays are frequent. If you can plan to be on Ta’u at the right time and the MV Manu’atele runs on schedule, you could ride it Ofu (or sometimes vice-versa) for free.

I have no personal experience with the MV Manu’atele other than learning that for unknown reasons, its trip which was supposed to take place the week before our visit was cancelled, resulting in fuel shortages that reduced the availability of alia boats. Reliability is all relative. For more information, look at photos of the MV Manu’atele, refer to the official page from American Samoa’s Department of Port Administration, and contact them via phone or email to obtain schedules.

4. What to bring

As mentioned in my guide to Tuitula, you will need your passport. The most essential thing is plenty of cash (US dollars), since nobody on Ofu is set to process credit cards. My experience suggests that you should bring more than you think you will need in case you are stranded.

I would bring snacks to go through the day, and maybe some favorite foods to supplement what is available on the island, especially if you have dietary restrictions. Everything brought to Ofu ends up in a landfill, so to reduce your footprint, bring the least amount of packaging possible.

Beyond that, it all depends on your planned activities, although it would be a pity to come on Ofu and not snorkel. The picture below includes a lot of photography equipment, some of it very specialized. Otherwise, I would have been able to easily travel with a single carry-on bag. On the bench in the background are the bags of my travel companion, who also brought a professional-grade photography kit.

Photo by Tommy Eng

There is no equipment for purchase on the island or outfitters. The Va’oto Lodge has snorkeling gear that you could borrow. However, to ensure a better fit, I recommend you bring your snorkel, mask, fins, beachwear, and maybe a snorkel vest for safety since you may be the only person at the beach. Given the time spent in the water and the intense sun, I prefer a long-sleeved swim shirt and pants. A sun hat covering the neck area is useful.

For hiking the Tumu Mountain Trail, good shoes and socks are a must, and although not necessary, I found hiking poles useful. A pair of sandals to wear at the beach makes it easier to keep your hiking shoes dry and free of sand. Wear long pants since much of the trail is covered with knee-high vegetation, some thorny. In a pinch, you can use water bottles from the place where you are saying, but you may prefer to bring your own. Biting insects did not bother me, but if you are sensitive to them, bring insect repellant.

If you want communications while on Ofu, which were essential for us to receive updates from the boatman, the good news is that 5G coverage is surprisingly good on most of the island, except during heavy rain when all communications are down because they rely on radio signal to Tuitula. However, you will need to buy a SIM card in Tuitula at the office of one of the local mobile carriers which are conveniently across the street from each other. There are two such companies in American Samoa, Bluesky and Astca. Bluesky being private, it makes little economic sense for them to provide coverage for the little populated Manu’a Islands. Astca is government operated like many services in American Samoa. Their service on the Manu’a Islands is generally good. However they seem afflicted by bureaucratic inefficiency: they had no SIM card that works a Motorola phone, and they ran out of eSIMs, something I thought was not possible.

5. Where to stay and eat

There are no resorts, hotels, or campgrounds in Ofu. Camping is prohibited in the national park, so would be on private land and require permission from the landowner or village chief. Accommodations consist of two clean B&B-type accommodations, each located across the road from an excellent swimming beach and near one end of the national park, only a five-minute walk from the park boundary (refer to map in next section). They are open year-round. There are no restaurants or bars in Ofu. A limited selection of groceries, mostly canned or frozen, is available at village stores in Ofu or Olosega. Meals are home-cooked by you or your host.

5.1 Va’oto Lodge

Most visitors stay at Vaoto Lodge because of its supremely convenient location, only steps away from the airstrip and about a ten-minute walk to Ofu Beach, and because of its stellar track record. Built in 1979 by Marge and Tito Malae on their family land, the lodge has been around since the earliest days of the national park. They have passed it to their daughter Deb, who currently runs the lodge with her laid-back husband Ben. Both go out of their way to make your stay great. Guests sleep in basic two-room cottages set in a lush garden and have access to a spacious communal building including a large kitchen and dining room, library, TV, and Wifi, giving the place the feeling of a homey hostel. In 2024, the rate was $130/night per room (two persons). Our room had AC, but hot water was rarely available. Marge, who has passed away, used to cook, but you now have to prepare your meals. However, you do not need to shop for groceries because Ben conveniently stocks up an abundant self-serve pantry with several fridges and freezers. You record in a register which items you use, and they get added to your final bill. Ben also offered us free freshly baked pizza and foccacia. For transportation, guests can choose from a dozen bicycles to borrow. However, as the mountain bikes needed some tuning up, the cruiser bikes were a better choice even though at least one section of the road requires pushing. In addition, Ben let us borrow his truck and on occasion gave us rides. Contact the lodge at their Gmail account vaotolodge.

5.2 Asaga Inn

The out-of-the-beaten path alternative is Asaga Inn. When I was there, it was ran by Celesty and her husband Ramond, both accommodating and friendly, but I’ve been told in August 2024 that they are moving back to the U.S. mainland. Its excellent location, steps away from the Ofu-Olosega bridge makes it a good base for exploring Olosega Island and the eastern part of Ofu Island on foot. The walk to Ofu Beach is about twenty minutes, and to get to the inn from the airport, which is three miles away, the hosts can arrange a ride. The rooms, which have two queen-size beds, AC, a mini fridge, and Wifi, are all located inside the main building and are much more spacious than the Vaoto Lodge’s rooms. In 2024, the rate was $150/night for one and $195/night for two, with meals included. Use of the kitchen incurs a surcharge. Contact information for Asaga Inn is listed on their Facebook page.

5.3 Homestay

Besides nature conservation, one of the reasons the National Park of American Samoa was established is to preserve the traditional Samoan way of life. The homestay program in the National Park of American Samoa is unique due to its deep cultural immersion and authentic experiences that go beyond typical tourist activities. Participants live with local Samoan families, allowing them to engage intimately with traditional practices, customs, and daily life. In Ofu, I stayed only at the two places described above, however I participated in a homestay on Ta’u and enjoyed the experience very much. Naturally, the program was suspended during the COVID pandemic, but you can inquire about its current status with the park visitor center.

6. What to do

It is a good time to mention that in American Samoa, most leisure activities are prohibited on Sundays due to the strong cultural and religious traditions of the territory. The majority of the population follows Christianity, and Sunday is considered a day of rest and worship. This sabbath, rooted in Samoan culture and reinforced by church teachings, emphasizes family time, spiritual reflection, and attending church services. As a result, businesses close, public gatherings are minimal, and recreational activities are restricted to preserve the sanctity of the day. If you are lucky, you may be invited to join a Toona’i (traditional Sunday lunch). On Sundays, all privately owned beaches are closed. However, Ofu Beach, being leased to the National Park Service, is exempt from the rule. The Tumu Mountain Trail is also closed, and hiking it is doubly offensive because climbing the island’s mountains on Sunday is considered disrespectful. I read that in 2017, a pair of Australian women went hiking on a Sunday and ended up lost on the mountain, requiring a massive rescue.

Blue square: recommended swimming location on Ofu Beach
Red triangle: main rip current on Ofu Beach
Green area: National Park of American Samoa
Orange line: GPS track for Tumu Mountain trail
(click on map for larger version)

6.1 Ofu Beach

The Ofu Unit of the National Park of American Samoa consists mostly of the two-mile-long Ofu Beach, on the south shore of Ofu Island. The palm-lined, sandy beach occasionally appears on lists of the world’s best beaches, but what makes it special is that your probability of having the entire beach to yourself and not seeing any single footprints is high. It is visited by fewer than a few hundred tourists a year, and the locals avoid it because they believe it to be haunted.

The primary activity in the Ofu Unit of the National Park of American Samoa is beachgoing. The water temperature is in the low 80s. Given the tropical weather, water-based activities are more pleasant and attractive than land-based activities, which goes a long way in explaining why travelers’ favorite experiences in the National Park of American Samoa are in Ofu.

Ofu Beach wouldn’t be that great without its fringing To’aga lagoon. Not only it intercepts the brunt of the surf, creating a sheltered space for swimming, but it also is home to an exceptionally beautiful reef teeming with 150 species of coral and almost 300 species of tropical fish. After being damaged by the 2009 tsunami, the reef has recovered and continues to thrive even though at low tide, the water heats up significantly. Thanks to its National Park status, Ofu Beach is protected and mostly undisturbed. Scientists have extensively studied it, hoping to learn how the Ofu reef manages to thrive in such warm water, which may hold clues for how to help other reefs stay healthy in a world that is heating up. A Samoan man who now lives in Hawaii told me that in his view, Ofu Beach has the best snorkeling in the world. At low tide, corals are just a few feet under the surface.

Ofu Beach starts a third of a mile from the Va’oto Lodge, but at that point the lagoon is narrow, resulting in rough waters. The safest place for snorkeling is where the lagoon is the widest, which corresponds roughly to the middle of the beach, about a mile from the Va’oto Lodge. That point was easily located in 2024 by a clearing with a construction site on the north side of the road and a footpath with a sheltered picnic table on its south side. You should be aware that northeast about a third of a mile from that location, you will run into Ofu Beach’s main rip current, which is visible on the satellite view and also on my photo from Tumu Mountain. A warning sign marked a nearby beach access. There are no lifeguards on duty!

6.2 Tumu Mountain

Tumu Mountain (also Mount Tumutumu) at 1,621 feet is the highest point on Ofu. The 5.5-mile (roundtrip) hike takes place in a rainforest that becomes increasingly lusher with elevation and leads to one of the best viewpoints in the South Pacific. The Va’oto Lodge’s library included an independently published travel guide to American Samoa that rated it as the best hike in the entire territory. The trail was initially a jeep road built to service the radio tower on the top of Tumu Mountain, but since then sections have become overgrown. Yet the NPS-maintained trail is well-graded and generally easy to follow. The summit of Tumu Mountain proper is forested with no views, however, a more recent trail extension leads to the Tumu Mountain Overlook, which rewards the hiker with a fantastic bird-eye view of Ofu, Olosega, and Ta’u in the distance – see also the opening photo.

The starting point for the hike is the end of the road at the northwestern tip of Ofu past the pier and is at sea level. Ben recommended not getting there on foot or bike due to aggressive dogs in the village, but instead getting a ride. The first part of the trail follows southeast a wide 4WD road bordered by coconut and palm trees past the Ofu Solar Park. In 2017, it provided 80% of the island’s electricity, while the goal of 100% solar energy was already attained on Ta’u Island. The second section, starting with a left turn marked by a trail sign, is on a narrower road heading north blocked by a few fallen trees until a sharp right turn. The third section climbs the Mako Ridge, heading southeast with a few views towards the island’s northeast. I often needed to duck below branches, and for a few passages, to carry my backpack by hand. In the middle, there is a brief moment where the trail is not obvious as everything is covered by a layer of greenery, otherwise, it is not difficult to follow.

The critical junction at 1,500 ft elevation (-14.17515, -169.65993) was marked only with a ribbon of pink tape. The Tumu Mountain Overlook extension heads to the left, while the trail to the summit continues straight. No worries if like me, you missed the junction. When you see the radio tower, turn around and you will find it in minutes. On the Internet, several write-ups including the one from the National Park Service mention getting to an overlook from the summit.

From the top, continue another 0.25 mi / 0.4 km on the new Tumu Mountain Trail extension to a rock outcropping on the Leolo Ridge with stunning views of three Manu’a islands and the coral lagoons in the national park.

However, given the configuration of the terrain, this sounds implausible unless it is a different overlook or they have a vague definition of the “top”. From the junction, a rough and faint user trail passes a fixed rope just before the overlook, a small area with a bench and sheer cliff drops below you. It took me two hours and a half to get there, including backtracking from the radio tower and taking photos. I stayed for about half an hour, at which point clouds moved in. Conversely, if when you get there, clouds obscure the views, hang on for a while, as the weather can change quickly.

If you start early in the day, temperatures are cooler, however, in the morning the view is backlit. The trail is mostly shaded, but on a sunny day, you would want sun protection for the first part. Bring snacks and plenty of water. Even hiking on a cloudy afternoon and a rainy evening, I was quickly drenched in sweat and would drink almost three quarts. gaiagps.com’s default map has the junction correctly marked, and you can view and downland my GPS track. If you use alltrails.com, the current version of their track has been corrected and is now accurate.

6.3 Other Activities

Because of the rarity of visitors, interaction with the park ranger was personal and rewarding. However, at the time of writing (2024), the Ofu Ranger station, which is located steps away from the airport and the Va’oto Lodge, was closed and no ranger stationed on Ofu. If you are looking for the “National Park of American Samoa, Manua Islands, AS” stamp, it was kept in the kitchen of Va’oto Lodge but is beat up with a degraded impression and the latest year available is 2023.

Ofu has no public transportation, taxis, or car rentals, however given its size of three miles long, it is an easy matter to bike or ride in the back of a truck on the entire island road. Its western end, the Tumu Mountain trailhead, is separated from its eastern end, the Ofu-Olosega Bridge by less than five miles. Coves and sea stacks offshore from Ofu Village are picturesque. Next to Ofu airport, the Va’oto Marsh is a small wetland frequented by uncommon birds. You can try to spot fruit bats, the only mammal native to Samoa, in trees along the road. In front of the Asaga Inn, a sandy beach can have calmer water than Ofu Beach owing to its north shore location. The smaller Olosega Island is joined to Ofu Island by the one-lane Ofu-Olosega Bridge over the 450-foot Asaga Strait. If you find the reef shallow for swimming, you will appreciate the deeper waters below the bridge. Some visitors like to jump from it at high tide. At low tide, you can walk from an island to the other, which is what villagers did before the bridge was built in 1970.

To free-dive in even deeper water, check out the north shore of Olosega Island near the abandoned village of Sili, where the reef drops off dramatically into oceanic depths. The Oge Beach Trail (2.7 miles round-trip, 400 elevation gain) starting at the end of Olosega Village road near the landfill climbs up the side of Mata’ala Ridge for great open views and descends steeply to the isolated coral rubble Oge Beach. It is said to be excellent for wildlife watching, including boobies and frigate birds. Permission from Olosega village is required. A spur trail more overgrown and rough than the Tumu Mountain Trail leads to the summit of Piumafua Mountain (2,063 feet), the high point of Olosega island. After two hikers needed a rescue in 2017 and failed to show proper gratitude, the village stopped permissions for that trail. I do not know its current status.

If you find that the sunset time of 6 pm is early, consider night activities, which will be nature-based since there is no entertainment on the island. Due to its isolation, the skies are some of the darkest and clearest. When you photograph from Ofu Beach towards the iconic mountains in the east, the lights of Olosega village intrude. For this reason, my favorite location for night photography is the Ofu-Olosega Bridge. The night is also a great time to spot the island’s coconut crabs.

Whether you choose to be active by day and night or to relax, just being on Ofu is a privilege – even when things do not go according to plan in this adventurous destination. For a narrative of how my latest week on Ofu unfolded, read my Ofu travel story. You can also look at all my photos of the National Park of American Samoa.

Part 3 of 5: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Tags: American Samoa, coast, hiking, location guide, national park of american samoa, national parks, nature, topics, travels
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Coconut Crab Hunting

Posted on June 29, 2024, 6:46 pm, by QT Luong, under Locations.

https://www.terragalleria.com/blog/coconut-crab-hunting

Going for a walk in the forest at night and in the rain may sound like a strange activity. However, joining a coconut crab hunt turned out to be an unexpected highlight of my stay in Ofu.

Throughout our second day on Ofu Island, the storm did not relent much. Between the episodes of torrential downpours, rainfall remained steady. To our relief, in the evening, it eased to light precipitation. We had been confined to the Vaoto lodge’s communal area since the morning, but we were going to go coconut crab hunting. I first read about the creatures from the words about Palmyra Island in Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument that Ian Shive contributed to Our National Monuments:

Almost every day is barefoot to some degree, but the football-sized coconut crabs keep you—well—on your toes. Their pincer is the second strongest vice grip in the animal kingdom, ranking somewhere between an alligator and lion’s jaws; thankfully, they prefer to scavenge the beaches and eat the flesh of a fallen coconut (hence their nickname).

After Manaia had mentioned that he would go coconut crab hunting in the evening with his grandson George, we were excited that he let us join him. I rushed to our cottage room to grab my rain jacket, camera, and lights. During a dry day, coconut crabs stay hidden in burrows to reduce water loss from heat. They are active at night or sometimes in wet weather, so a rainy evening is the right time to look for them outside of their holes.

Not as inaccessible as Palmyra, yet with a tiny population of about fifty, Ofu Island is the right place to look for them. The only native mammal on the Samoan Islands are fruit bats. Coconut crabs have no predators. Their initial range corresponded to the native range of the palm coconut. However, because their meat is considered a delicacy now reserved for special occasions, they are subject to extensive hunts and have all but vanished in populated places. They were once present on Tuitula, the main island of American Samoa, but nowadays none are left. On Tau, Manaia’s home island which has a population an order of magnitude larger than Ofu Island, one needs to venture to remote areas to find them. On Ofu, they can be located a short stroll behind the lodge.

Despite their name, coconut crabs feed on several fruits and nuts. Coconuts are only a small part of their diet, but they seem to like them enough to sometimes climb coconut trees and cut down a coconut from it. They can open coconuts to eat their flesh, but despite their incredibly strong claws, the process can take days. A cut coconut with exposed flesh is therefore irresistible. During the day, Manaia walks into the forest and lays cut coconuts near their burrows. The hunt consists of walking back the same path at night, hoping to see a crab so engrossed with eating a coconut bait that it becomes easy prey. Despite their formidable claws, they are not difficult to catch if one knows how to handle them. To kill them Manaia needs only to reach with one hand to their underside and break the equivalent of their neck with a quick finger press.

The key is to find them at the right moment. To a westerner, Manaia’s method of hunting may appear inefficient compared to trapping. He views coconut crab hunting as a sport akin to fishing. That traditional Samoan approach helps maintain a natural balance with the natural world. During our hunt, we found several specimens of seemingly respectable size, but none were mature enough for Manaia to catch. Coconut crabs can live up to sixty years, and reach up to nine lbs of weight and sixteen inches of body length. They are part of arthropods, a taxonomic class that includes crustaceans and all insects. Of all arthropods, they are the largest terrestrial species. One would expect to find them at the beach, however, although coconut crabs start their lives as plankton before a transitional hermit-crab phase, mature coconut crabs are land animals that cannot swim nor breathe in water – their gills are vestigial and instead they have developed peculiar lungs. On Ofu Island, they dwell in the forest.

Only minutes away from the lodge, the hilly forest terrain is tricky to walk at night as the rain makes the ground, rocks, and branches slippery. At the same time, the jungle vegetation presents constant obstacles. Despite bringing a bulky underwater strobe, I did not pack a regular flash for my camera, so I light the crabs with a flashlight in my left hand, which leaves only my right hand to hold the camera. Even using ISO values up to 12,800 I still need to compromise with less than ideal depth of field or shutter speed while the critter is trying to scurry away from the spotlight. On three different hunts, Manaia has not caught a crab of appropriate size. However, I feel privileged just to have seen the creatures in the wild, knowing that it is an experience that few had and that I could have easily missed. In a trip during which so many plans were thwarted, this unplanned activity turned out to be a highlight.

Part 2 of 5: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Tags: American Samoa, national park of american samoa, nature, photography, travels, tropics, wildlife
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A Week on Ofu Island: Setbacks in Paradise

Posted on June 21, 2024, 10:54 pm, by QT Luong, under Locations.

https://www.terragalleria.com/blog/a-week-on-ofu-island-setbacks-in-paradise

Summary: a personal account of a week on Ofu Island in the National Park of American Samoa during which carefully-laid plans were thwarted by a combination of weather, equipment failures, and transportation issues threatening to leave us stranded in the South Pacific.

My friend Tommy travels without plans or expectations. This approach, increasingly popular with some photographers, guarantees he won’t experience disappointments that can mar even a trip to a paradisiac tropical island. However, for the National Park of American Samoa (read some background, or a comprehensive practical guide to Ofu that provides a perspective complementary to this travel story) it would have been difficult for me to embrace, because I had been there before and knew what I missed then. The label for my National Park of American Samoa photograph in the exhibit Treasured Lands starts as follows:

In Polynesia, a paradise-like chain of volcanic mountainous islands clothed in the greenery of old-world tropical rainforest is ringed with steep sea cliffs, glistening beaches, and biologically rich South Pacific coral reefs.

In 2002, when I visited Ofu Island, considered by many to be the crown jewel of the National Park of American Samoa, I realized that those three distinctive elements of the park could be captured in a single iconic image: a split image whose top would depict the beach and mountains, and whose bottom would be an underwater view of the coral reefs. However, the Nikonos V camera that I brought was insufficient to photograph that vision. In addition, due to unforeseen logistical problems, I could spend only two days on Ofu, one of which was cloudy, which isn’t good for shallow underwater photography. In the following decade, a few photographers captured a split image of Ofu. Only one of them, Floris van Breugel, fulfilled my vision of the iconic image. Photographs like that, which could tell by themselves the story of the park do not happen just by serendipity or immersing oneself in the moment and communing with nature.

After I decided on short notice to join Tommy for a trip to American Samoa, my priority was to try to make the photograph that had eluded me. I meticulously reviewed the previous split images I had made before in other locations to understand how they could be improved. I studied all the materials I could find about this most challenging type of photograph. I gave serious thought about upgrading my digital underwater set-up – a 15-year old Canon 5Dmk2 and 17-40mm lens in an Ikelite housing with an 8-inch dome port – and obtained a pro-deal, but after testing, for various reasons eventually decided to stick to my existing equipment. I built a custom floating board and practiced in a swimming pool. Despite the seemingly draconian weight limit for flights to Ofu, I packed all sorts of gear for underwater photography to make sure I would be prepared to deal with many situations. As another objective was to hike the trails that had eluded me, I researched them thoroughly and packed serious hiking equipment.

First day on Ofu: scouting in cloudy weather

A few days after we travel to American Samoa, we land on Ofu in sunny weather, with just a few tropical clouds in the clear blue sky. As the Vaoto Lodge is just a few steps from where the plane parks on the airstrip, it is quick work pulling my duffel bag across the lawn. I was eager to get in the water, but before we had to attend the welcome briefing from Ben, the friendly and laid-back Vaoto Lodge caretaker, and unpack our bags. I also needed to reconfigure my camera backpack to fit the bulky underwater housing and snorkeling gear. We walk along the island’s only road from the lodge to Ofu Beach. For the first one-third of a mile, the bank from the road descends steeply into ocean water. As soon as we see a beach, we scramble down. Seeing that clouds have moved in and the water appears choppy, I swim without the camera for a visual inventory. The water is delightfully warm, corals are diverse, and fish are abundant. However, due to the overcast sky, underwater views are murky and wave action ruins the visibility by stirring up the sand. It starts raining. On the way out, the surf pounds me, and I end up with sand all over my hair. Cloudy weather is not favorable for underwater photography as one needs the sun to shine into the water to light up the subjects and create contrast. Therefore, we return to the lodge, borrowing bikes to scout for a segment of the beach where the lagoon would be wider and the water calmer. Biking to the bridge between Ofu Island and Olosega Island, we stop at several locations and note the conditions, hoping to return the next day in better weather.

Second day on Ofu: storm

Those hopes are dashed when the day starts with heavy rain and wind. When it is only raining, I can enjoy a photography session despite the inconvenience of having to struggle to keep the gear dry under an umbrella. High wind makes that impractical, so we spend the entire day inside the lodge’s spacious common area. Wifi is available and my Astca SIM card provided a reliable cellular signal the day before, but today nothing works. The Manua Islands consisting of Ofu, Olosega, and Tau normally get their internet and cellular phone from an undersea fiber optic cable. Instead of having it land at a beach, they laid it over the reef where it got damaged. While repairs are in progress, they transmit data to the local towers by radio signal. Water in the atmosphere affects the transmission of the signal over the lengthy 60 miles separating the Manua Islands from Pago-Pago, the main city in American Samoa. As a result, cellular and internet are down. As it rains all day, we socialize with the other guests. Besides Tommy and I, the only other tourists on the islands are the kind family of Greg Miller, Mary, and their daughter Abi who is a park ranger at Rocky Mountain National Park. Manaia (“Nice”) and his grandson George live on Tau Island. They were hoping to catch a fishing boat for the crossing from Ofu to Ta’u, but in that storm, it was not possible. Walking in the forest at night in the rain may sound like a strange activity. However, thanks to Manaia, it turned out to be the highlight of our day, when he invited us to join him for coconut crab hunting.

Third day on Ofu: rain

As Saturday started with no rain, I thought of hiking Tumu Mountain since the trail will be closed on Sunday and we planned to cross over to Tau Island on Monday. However, when I see a clearing, I try my chance at the beach. As I set up to drive the truck, Manaia and the Millers asked to join and drive to the bridge. They take a while to get ready and eventually drop me off with all my photography gear in the backpack and all my underwater gear in the duffel bag at a beach Tommy and I had scouted two days before. By this time, The clearing is gone. It lasted only fifteen minutes. As rain starts, I take cover under the only shelter available along the two miles of Ofu Beach until the others pick me up a few hours later. It rains most of the afternoon and evening. Since I have already used up three of four days on Ofu without results, I am pondering extending the stay. Hawaiian Airlines has a monopoly on flights from the United States to Pago-Pago, American Samoa’s only sizable airport. The other routes home are circuitous and involve transit through at least three airports, which would be burdensome given my luggage. When I look for new flights to Honolulu from Pago-Pago, I discover that everything is sold out for the next 25 days, even though Hawaiian Airlines has added a Thursday flight for the summer to the Monday and Wednesday flights. Flights to Pago-Pago and the Manua Islands are not available every day, therefore one has to make choices when arranging a trip to American Samoa. The combined length of Ofu and Olosega Islands is less than four miles, their surface area is five square miles, and the national park consists of a stretch of two miles of beach. Because of that, when Tommy asked for itinerary suggestions, I proposed to spend a few days on Tau Island. Tau and Ofu/Olosega are less than seven miles apart, so it made more sense to cross by boat and book our Manua Islands return flight to Pago-Pago from Tau rather than flying from Ofu to Pago-Pago and then from Pago-Pago to Ta’u. However, it meant that to catch our flight from Pago-Pago to Honolulu next Wednesday, we would have to be able to make the crossing to Ta’u. Manaia had offered to join him on the boat on Saturday, but having made no underwater photographs (let alone any satisfactory beach photographs) so far, I had declined. It turned out that on Saturday the surf was still too high for a boat crossing.

Fourth day on Ofu: cloudy Ofu Beach and flooded housing

I get up at 6 am, but seeing that it is cloudy, go back to sleep. At 9 am, the weather seems to be improving. After I eat breakfast in a hurry, we drop off my bags at the beach shelter, then return on bikes for maximum flexibility. I do a quick round of beach photos on land in sunny conditions. By the time I get in the water, a cloud hanging over the mountain is shading the lagoon, so although the sky is mostly clear, no sunlight penetrates the water. Today is my first, and possibly only chance to make the photograph I envisioned. Wave action is less strong than the other day, but there is considerable current. At first, I try to fight against it, but it is impossible to stay in place, even if standing chest-high in the water. For each of my swimming passes, I walk to the west end of the beach and drift for a few hundred yards past the shelter. After several passes where I aim for over/under shots, underwater stills, and underwater video, the sky gets overcast and I feel cold. Although conditions were less than ideal, thanks to my preparation I may have gotten something. I hesitate to call it a day. One of the reasons I brought my heavy scuba-diving grade underwater housing rather than a much lighter surf housing was to use underwater strobes in case natural light was less than optimal. Since I have not yet deployed the strobe, I set up for one more pass. I am already tired, I feel hurried because it is late in the day, and I have to set up the cumbersome underwater strobe. Upon entering the water, I realize something is off and stand up immediately. The housing drains an unusual amount of water. I had failed to close one of the latches fully. Back at the shelter, I open the housing and try to turn on the Canon camera. It doesn’t. Saltwater is deadly to electronics. That evening, we moved to the Asaga Inn, whose owner, Celesty had been in correspondence with Tommy about arranging a boat from Ta’u. In the evening, she states that only the next morning will the boatman be able to assess the seas and decide whether he can come from Ta’u to pick us up. Having ruined my Canon camera, I cannot make another serious attempt at the split shot. I am very eager to move on to Ta’u, where there are two routes that I want to hike. In the while, it is a bit of a consolation that the location is favorable for night photography.

Fifth day on Ofu: travel delay and cloudy Tumu Mountain

On Monday, I am up at 4:45 am for some night photography and to restart a time-lapse sequence from the bridge. Celeste is also up but has not heard from the boatman. Tommy and I stay on the bridge until after sunrise, after which I launch my drone – take-offs are not possible further west because of the airstrip. Suddenly, Manaia shows up with the truck to pick us up for the crossing. Back at the Vaoto Lodge, we learn that although the seas have calmed, there are still breakers at the particular harbor where the boat is located, preventing it from exiting the harbor. There is a boat on Ofu, but the captain is out of fuel, possibly because the supply cargo trip of last week was canceled. We called Samoan Airlines eight times to inquire about the Tuesday flight. Only one time someone picks up the phone, and after Manaia talks with them in Samoan, they transfer the line to the relevant desk which does not answer. Tommy is not surprised, since in the lead-up to the trip, he spent more than $80 on long-distance calls, most of them consisting of being on hold. Waiting for updates from the boatman means having to stick around the lodge instead of going about our day. I have never packed a laptop on any of my photography trips before, but for this one, I made an exception because I wanted to be able to review the split shots to make sure that I nailed them and correct any mistakes if necessary. During the downtime, I try to access the Canon’s Compact Flash card from the laptop. It is dead. Unlike SD cards, which are waterproof, CF cards have many openings for pins that make them vulnerable to water. I have no underwater photographs. The feeling of failure sets in. Past 1 pm, Manaia announces that there will be no boat today. Although it is cloudy, I decided to hike Tumu Mountain. Manaia drops me off at the trailhead at 2 pm. Previously, he had asked if I needed a machete. Two visitors replied the same as I did, that if they needed one, it would be time to turn around. They ended up turning around quickly. However, I find the lush rainforest trail easier to follow than expected even though I often need to duck below branches. Two hours later, in sight of the radio tower, I realized I had missed the junction for the overlook. Going down, I find the junction marked with pink tape and hike the faint trail to a single fixed rope, arriving at the overlook at 4:30 pm. Action and a relative sense of accomplishment have helped me get past the disappointment of the lost water photos. Even in cloudy conditions, the view is great, maybe among the top ten park views. To the eye, the colors are a muted grey, but they are there and Lightroom color slider moves of 10 units are sufficient to reveal them. Less than an hour after my arrival, low clouds obscured the view entirely. It starts raining, sometimes heavily. The umbrella is not useful since I need to use the hiking poles, and as my glasses get wet, I struggle to see well in the dark. Arriving early at the trailhead for the arranged 7:00 pickup, I walk to the pier from where the sea looks navigable. At the Vaoto Lodge, eggs and tofu have run out, so I content myself with peanut butter as the sole protein source.

Sixth day on Ofu: travel delay and cloudy Ofu Beach

I wake up at 5:45 am on Tuesday and photograph in cloudy conditions until 8:30 am. Back at the lodge, I pack hastily and drag my bags to the airstrip where we bid farewell to the Millers and try without success for stand-by seats for the 10 am flight. A new guest, Whitney Lauritsen, a woman of many talents, arrives. She is on a quest to visit all the parks and is missing only the Virgin Islands and Alaska. Fed up with wasting time at the lodge waiting in vain for the news from the boatman, we head out to the bridge in sunny conditions. By the time we are back to the national park beach, the clouds darken the waters again. I had packed up a backup underwater camera, the Sony RX100 in a Meikon housing with an additional Inon wide-angle lens. The water is calmer than on Sunday, but the current is still strong, so I go for a drift snorkel with Whitney. On the first pass, I notice a strong left-side vignetting on all images. Examining the housing on the land, I find that two small rubber pads are missing, causing the camera to be misaligned. I cut a rubber band from my camera emergency kit using the survival tool in my camera bag and installed it in place of the pads. On another pass, pictures suffer from fogging. Having not used the Meikon housing for years, I had forgotten that the Inon lens is best used with water filling the space between the lens and the housing. My last pass takes place around 5:30 pm, without a strobe, I crank ISO to 1600, but shutter speeds are still marginal, so I call it quits. See the under-over split shots I was able to get from that afternoon. Tomorrow, we need to catch the flight from Tau in the morning, otherwise, we won’t be able to make our return flight from Pago-Pago. Because of his trade as an electrician – despite having majored in art at UCLA, Manaia knows everybody in the Mauna Islands, yet he has not been able to secure a boat passage to Tau in five days. As we go to bed without hearing a word from the boatman, Tommy and Whitney plan to hike the next day to Tumu Mountain. Since Tommy wanted to start at 6:30 am, I was thinking that if I joined them for a chance at better light than I had, I could return to the beach at midday.

From Ofu to home

At 8:15 am on Wednesday, George yells that the boat is at the pier. According to plan, we would have been on the Tumu Mountain Trail, but Whitney needed to finish some client work in the morning. Since we did not hear from the boatman in the morning nor the evening before, Manaia packs in a hurry. By the time we get to the pier, it is almost 9 am, making it certain that we will miss our flight at 10:05. A cargo ship is moored at the pier. When we learn that it will leave in a couple of hours for Pago-Pago, we calculate that the eight-hour crossing may make it possible for us to catch our flight to Honolulu and we decide to go for it. However, the Coast Guard does the vessel to take us, so we are back to the alia. The harbor is on the west end of Ofu, so we need to navigate 12.5 miles of ocean, which takes about an hour. The seas are rough, but the ride with the fishermen is fun. Although I try to shield my A7R5 camera from water splashes, it still gets wet. Since the second day on Ofu, my A7R4 kept stubbornly displaying an error message “Accessory not compatible” even when the lens and battery are from Sony. After I dismissed the message, I had only a few seconds of respite before it popped again. Now my A7R5 is also afflicted by this behavior (note: after a week in dry California weather, both cameras appear to have recovered). This adds to a litany of equipment issues, as during that trip, I also cracked my expensive and hard-to-replace Firecrest polarizer and my previously reliable Induro tripod developed the dreaded floppy legs syndrome. In addition, both of my wide-angle and normal zooms often developed internal condensation resulting in locally lowered contrast. At the harbor of Faleasao on Ta’u, we hitchhike on a truck that takes us to Siufaga from where we have a better chance of catching a ride across the island to Manaia’s house. A third ride on the back of a truck takes us to the airport around 11:30 am. The airline agent mentions an afternoon charter flight, so we hang out. Passengers begin to arrive, but suddenly it starts raining torrentially. The plane was on its way, but due to poor visibility at the Tau airport, it turned around and landed in Pago-Pago. After more waiting, we learn that the flight has been canceled for the day. We were so close to having made it. Manaia offers us to stay at his artistically decorated home next to the beach where he demonstrates the meaning of Samoan hospitality. On my 2002 trip to American Samoa, although I had spent involuntarily five days on Tau, the lack of information caused me to miss the difficult and seldom-traveled trails to Lafauti Fall and Lata Mountain. One of my goals on this trip was to hike them, but that won’t happen. Because the rain has resumed, we don’t even attempt to visit the national park.

After all those setbacks, things suddenly work in our favor on Thursday to get us home. At the airport, we meet Eseta, the charming homestay host with whom we would have stayed if we had reached Tau on schedule. She mentions that in June, the Park Service will start rebuilding the trail to Lata Mountain for which I had envisioned hiring guides to cut the way up with machetes. The charter flight is not full, and the person who commissioned it agrees to let us ride back to Pago-Pago with them. At the Hawaiian Airlines office, Tommy miraculously obtains guaranteed standby seats. We spent the rest of the day touring the western part of Tuitula Island with Whitney, during which I rebooked my flight from Honolulu to SFO, whose cost in miles has ballooned to 31K. The last moment of concern comes at the departure lounge. The Hawaiian Airlines agent had handed me out a boarding pass without a seat assignment, with instructions to wait for my name to be called. All the other passengers, including Tommy, are seated in the airliner, it is past flight time, and they still have not called the names of the passengers to be assigned seats. I am eventually given a boarding pass with a window seat next to Tommy. It all worked out and I got home on Saturday, which was not a given. I was so concerned about how to get out of the islands, but in retrospect I felt privileged just to have been there. Although difficult in the moment, despite all the unrealized plans, the trip to American Samoa worked out as a great experience, and as a preparation for the next one. If this story has inspired you to visit Ofu, be sure to read my comprehensive guide to Ofu Island.

Part 1 of 5: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Tags: American Samoa, coast, hiking, national park of american samoa, national parks, nature, photography, travels, tropics, underwater
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