The Terra Galleria Blog – QT Luong

This article features a supremely diverse mix of ten lesser-visited national parks all around the country. They all offer fantastic scenery and are almost sure to provide you with the quiet experience that you hoped for when you headed to a national park.

Having spent more than a quarter century photographing each of the 63 U.S. national parks, I particularly cherished my visits to the parks less traveled. My book Treasured Lands: A Photography Odyssey through America’s National Parks aimed to illustrate and describe in detail not only the better-known parks but also the less-visited hidden gems. Based on my experience, here are ten parks without crowds presented in decreasing order of visitation.

1. Capitol Reef National Park, Utah.

Colorado Plateau region, 1,230,000 visits in 2022

Among the cornucopia of natural environments found on the American continent, maybe the most unusual are those of the Colorado Plateau, where a convergence of geology and climate has created landscapes without equal anywhere else. Capitol Reef National Park is less known than its neighboors in the region , yet it offers a variety of rock formations that rival any other national park of the Colorado Plateau. Sheer monoliths, domes, canyons, and arches highlight the Waterpocket Fold, a 100-mile-long wrinkle on the earth’s crust. The opportunity for solitude in addition to the variety of landscapes makes Capitol Reef one of my favorite national parks.

Temples of the Moon and of the Sun, Cathedral Valley. Capitol Reef National Park

Most visitors stay on UT 24 and the scenic drive. They cover only a tiny portion of the park but still offer great diversity and a relatively uncrowded experience. Venture on the extensive network of dirt roads south or north of UT 24, and you’ll fully appreciate what the park has to offer. You will make fantastic discoveries, as both the southern and northern sections of the park would have been deserving of national park status by themselves. You will see only a few souls during the whole day. To access locations such as the majestic Cathedral Valley with striking monoliths or the Strike Valley and Hall Creek overlooks, you have to be willing to leave the pavement, but in normal conditions, you don’t need a particularly rugged vehicle.

Thanks to the Fremont River, the park has more vegetation than other neighboring parks and makes a spring or fall visit particularly rewarding. Fruit trees growing in historic orchards bloom from March to May. Autumn foliage color peaks during the last week of October. Hot summers and cold winters bring their own opportunities, such as monsoon clouds and snow, but are not the best seasons for exploring outside of the pavement, as melting snow and summer thunderstorms can turn dirt roads into impassable mud.

2. Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota

Rockies and Prairie region, 660,000 visits in 2022

In Theodore Roosevelt National Park it is easy to experience the isolation of the badlands much the same way that Theodore Roosevelt had more than a hundred years ago. What the North Dakota badlands lack in starkness compared with the better-known Badlands National Park in Southern Dakota is more than made up by a more rugged character, abundant wildlife and vegetation, and the flow of the Little Missouri River. In addition, you will find rare geological phenomena, such that cannonball concretions, caprock hoodoos, and petrified wood.

Grasslands and badlands, Painted Canyon. Theodore Roosevelt National Park

The park comprises two main units. The South Unit is the largest, most developed, and most visited, and it has more varied landscapes, more trails, and more wildlife. Bison and prairie dogs live in both the south and north sections, but only the South Unit features roadside prairie dog towns and roaming wild horses. In addition to the 36-mile scenic loop inside the South Unit, there is an excellent overlook at Painted Canyon Visitor Center right off I-94 from which a wide range of compositions are possible. The North Unit, which is 70 miles from the South Unit and has a 14-mile scenic drive, is more scenic, wild, and quiet, with only 10 percent of the park’s visitation. Most of the areas of interest are roadside or accessible through short hikes.

Winters are very cold. In early spring, the grass is bleached, but by mid-May, it has greened up and wildflowers begin to appear, lasting into July in the prairie flats and river valleys. Thunderstorms create great skies in the summer. Late September brings autumn foliage to the aspen and cottonwoods lining the banks of the Little Missouri River.

3. Big Bend National Park, Texas

Desert region, 514,000 visits in 2022

Lying 325 miles from El Paso, TX, the closest major city, Big Bend National Park is one of the most remote and least-visited parks in the continental U.S. The three roads leading to the park do not pass through any other location. Your destination, should you drive in that direction, can only be the vast national park, one of the largest (1,250 square miles). Due to its size, maybe except during spring break, the park feels uncrowded even if you stay on the 100 miles of paved roads. A high-clearance four-wheel-drive vehicle allows you to explore the large network of primitive and isolated roads.

Agaves on South Rim, morning. Big Bend National Park

Photographers will find easy-to-access and beautiful landscapes encompassing three distinct environments: the deep canyons of the Rio Grande River such as Santa Elena Canyon, the desert, and the Chisos Mountains. That compact mountain range, the southernmost in the U.S., can be captured rising from the surrounding desert but is also penetrated by a road that leads to the Chisos Basin. The South Rim, my prefered hike for superlative views anchored by the park’s iconic agaves, starts from there.

The park’s varied topography supports beautiful flora. While something blooms in almost every season, annual wildflowers are most abundant in February and March, whereas cacti start blooming in April, usually peaking in late May. You will also find more diverse wildlife than you’d expect in such arid terrain, including more species of birds (around 350) than in any other national park. Temperatures are most pleasant from late fall to early spring, with a dusting of snow possible in the winter on the high peaks. Late spring to early fall brings temperatures above 100°F to the desert, igniting frequent dramatic thunderstorms. Most of the accommodations and park activities are in the Chisos Basin, which is cooler than the desert.

4. Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve, Alaska

Alaska region, 453,000 visits in 2022

Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve is a vast roadless marine wilderness dominated by tall coastal mountains. There are trails at Bartlett Cove, but the park’s highlight is to observe close some of the fifteen large tidewater glaciers calving icebergs into the water, about 50 miles up the bay. In addition to the abundant wildlife typical of Alaska, the park is home to spectacular marine life. The vast majority of visitors to Glacier Bay see the park from the high deck of a cruise ship. This accounts for the park’s relatively high visitation number for Alaska, but those passengers do not actually set foot in the park. A smaller, concessionaire-operated tour boat, departs daily during summer months from Bartlett Cove and offers a day-long tour covering 130 miles for whale watching, photography, and wildlife viewing. Although this boat can drop off and pick up backcountry kayakers, it does not offer landings to day trippers. Both types of vessels visit tidewaters glaciers such as Margerie Glacier.

Terminal front of Margerie Glacier. Glacier Bay National Park

There are two ways to land: by kayak or small charter boat. Either of them will provide you total solitude beside the occasional vessel in the distance, and access to places that very few have seen close. My two favorites were Mc Bride Glacier and Lamplugh Glacier. Kayaking the bay is a tough trip: the marine environment of the bay is extremely dynamic, with wet weather and ice-cold water. Some of the highest tides plus strongest tidal currents I’ve seen anywhere, rising and falling up to 25 feet, require careful planning. Multi-day trips are required to reach the glaciers. Typically for Alaska, charter boats are expensive. However, in a few days aboard one of them, I saw more glaciers than during my whole previous two-week expedition on a kayak, while traveling in comfort—I didn’t even need to bring a water bottle.

The visitor season lasts from mid-May to mid-September, when services are available at Bartlett Cove, the main hub of the park. May and June are the least-rainy months, then precipitation increases, leading to rainy weather in late August and September.

5. Congaree National Park, South Carolina

Southeastern Hardwoods region, 204,000 visits in 2022

Congaree National Park preserves the largest remaining old-growth bottomland forest in North America. This little-visited park combines the watery environment of the Everglades with the towering old-growth forests of the West. Congaree is frequently ranked as one of the “worse” national parks. While it does lack the diversity and appeal of better-known parks, its unique environment is very rewarding for a short visit.

Bald cypress and tupelo in summer. Congaree National Park

The park is a small 41 square miles, but you cannot explore it by driving. Hiking and canoeing are the only ways to immerse yourself in the forest. Starting from the visitor center, the flat, easy 2.4-mile Boardwalk Loop Trail is a good introduction to the park, offering diverse perspectives and natural environments. Water floods the forest about ten times per year, creating opportunities to photograph beautiful reflections. However, even if you come when the forest isn’t flooded, you can still find water in creeks and lakes. In dry conditions, my favorite spot along the Boardwalk Loop is Weston Lake, an abandoned channel of the Congaree River where I photographed trees growing out of the water, emblematic of the South. The most memorable experience in the park was riding a canoe through a narrow channel beneath a canopy of trees on Cedar Creek. As with the Everglades, exploring via water provides you with a unique perspective.

The environment is mostly a deciduous forest with no distant views, most easily photographed in cloudy conditions. In the early spring, you are more likely to find the forest flooded. The most beautiful time to visit is in late autumn when the foliage turns various shades of yellow and red. In the winter the trees are bare. Spring and fall are the most comfortable seasons, as summers are hot and humid and bring lots of mosquitoes.

6. Great Basin National Park, Nevada

Basin region, 142,100 visits in 2022

Accessed by way of Hwy 50, “the loneliest road in America” in the middle of the American West (some would say in the middle of nowhere), Great Basin National Park is one of the least-visited national parks. Even when crowds fill the Southern Utah and California national parks, midway between them, Great Basin remains quiet. It is not because of the lack of attractions. I cannot think of any other national park that offers a more intriguing mix of natural wonders: a cave with rare formations, a peak with one of the most southerly glaciers, bristlecone pines and aspen growing nearby, the six-story limestone Lexington Arch.

Bristelecone pines on Mt Washington. Great Basin National Park

Most visits take place along the only paved road in the park, the 12-mile Wheeler Peak Scenic Drive. It passes by the visitor center under which Lehman Caves are situated and ends at 10,000 feet, at the trailhead for the best hikes in the park. However, if the main section of the park is not quiet enough, there are also five unpaved roads that lead to remote valleys and to Washington Peak, where I found the most beautiful bristlecone pine grove in the park, set against great views. Most of the attractions can be reached by moderate day hikes

Tours of Lehman Cave take place year-round. Snow closes the upper 8 miles of the Wheeler Peak Scenic Drive from November to May. Summer is a pleasant time to hike the high trails, which enjoy moderate temperatures while the desert below simmers. Aspen groves on the upper slopes of the park are at the peak of their autumn color in late September.

7. Dry Tortugas National Park, Florida

Tropics region, 78,500 visits in 2022

Few people visit Dry Tortugas National Park because of its remote location, yet it is a unique place with a powerful surrealistic appeal. An unexpected huge historic fort tops some of the most beautiful coral reefs and beaches in the United States. Fewer people yet camp on the island, which I felt was a wonderful experience.

Bush Key with conch shell and beached seaweed. Dry Tortugas National Park

The ferry trips starting from Key West take 3 hours each way, arriving around 10.30 AM and leaving at 2:45 PM. While by the numbers Dry Tortugas is the third least visited national park in the continental U.S., the 200 daily visitors are quite noticeable on the tiny Garden Key. Bush Key always remains serene but is sometimes closed for nesting birds. However, by midafternoon, the day-trippers are gone. You then share the island with at most two dozen campers.

An overnight stay may seem unnecessary, considering the tiny size of the island, but there is much more to discover than it appears at first, especially if you are equipped for water activities. With its warm and clear water and abundant marine life, it is as good a place as any to try your hand at underwater photography at midday. In the late afternoon, when the light is less favorable for underwater photography, you can photograph a deserted fort without harsh sun. Besides ample time, sunset, sunrise, and night photography opportunities, you get to witness the daily cycles of life on the island, such as thousands of colorful hermit crabs of all sizes and shapes crawling all over the place, including up the trees, in the summer evenings. A bit of planning is necessary since camping there is primitive and everything you need, in particular, food and water, has to be brought.

8. North Cascades National Park, Washington

Pacific region, 30,200 visits in 2022

Deserving of being called America’s Alps for steepness and glaciation, North Cascades National Park preserves some of America’s finest mountain landscapes, The park is also only three hours from Seattle, yet it is one of the least-visited parks in the lower 48 states, second only to remote and roadless Isle Royale National Park. This is because North Cascades National Park proper is managed as a wilderness without facilities and almost no road access, accessible only to hikers, backpackers, and mountaineers. Cascade Pass enlived by wildflowers in summer and Easy Pass brightened by golden larches in autum are two favorite and contrasting access points to the park’s high country.

Colonial Peak and Pyramid Peak above Diablo Lake on rainy evening, North Cascades National Park Service Complex

However, If you are not ready to climb over those strenuous passes, you can still find excellent views from lower, more developed and accessible areas adjacent to the park. Most of them are part of the larger North Cascades National Park Service Complex, which also includes the Ross Lake National Recreation Area (863,000 visits) and Lake Chelan National Recreation Area (37,600 visits). The most iconic view in the whole range is found at roadside Picture Lake, located in the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest. The North Cascades Highway (SR 20) is considered by some to be the most scenic mountain drive in Washington. It runs through the Ross Lake National Recreation Area, providing access to roadside views of reservoir lakes such as Diablo Lake surrounded by mountain peaks, often made more evocative by low mist.

That far north, summer is very short. At higher elevations, trails are free of snow only from July to September. Wildflowers peak in the valleys in May, but in alpine areas, not until late July. Most fall colors start one month later, lasting into October. The first winter snows (usually early November) close SR 20 until April.

9. Isle Royale National Park, Michigan

Southeastern Hardwoods region, 25,500 visits in 2022

Isle Royale National Park, situated in the northwest corner of Lake Superior, is defined by its isolation. The island is only accessible by a lengthy boat crossing and consists of a roadless backcountry. The least-visited national park in the continental United States, Isle Royale National Park receives fewer visitors in a year than Yosemite does on a summer day. The few who make it there take the time to soak in this North Woods wilderness fringed by a beautiful shoreline, where moose sightings are not uncommon. Visitors there stay on average for three and a half days, while the average visitor to a national park stays for just 4 hours.

Bull moose in summer forest. Isle Royale National Park

The two areas with facilities, Windigo and Rock Harbor, are situated at either end of the island. They are about 45 miles apart by trail, and it takes 5 hours to link them via the Voyageur II, which circles the island. Public ferries and seaplanes service the park, and your itinerary will dictate the best one to use. A day visit is possible, but I do not recommend it. Day visitors must hurry for a few hours of sightseeing in mid-day light, much less than the time they spend on the boat. Overnight backpacking or kayaking trips truly unlock the island. However, day hikes can also be satisfying. Rock Harbor is the more scenic and developed of the two main areas, with the only lodge on the island. From there, you can go on day hikes, take sightseeing tours on the M/V Sandy, or rent motorized and nonmotorized boats. The Voyageur II makes a number of stops mid-island, at docks close to campsites. After a drop-off, you could set up camp close to the dock and explore the surroundings on day hikes or with a kayak, which can be transported by the Voyageur II.

Isle Royale is the only national park with an annual closure. Boat transportation is only available from May to early October. In June and July, wildflowers peak, but so do swarms of biting insects. July and August are the peak months, and the only time when the facilities are fully available. Late September, my favorite time to visit, brings with it the fall colors.

10. Lake Clark National Park and Preserve, Alaska

Alaska region, 16,400 visits in 2022

Lake Clark National Park, situated on the Alaska Peninsula, preserves a supremely varied and beautiful wilderness with all the geographical features of Alaska concentrated in a relatively small area. Due to their remoteness, Alaska’s national parks are among the least visited in the country. Maybe because of the lack of famous features, Lake Clark National Park is one of the least-visited in Alaska, despite its relative ease of access. It is in Anchorage’s “backyard,” about an hour away by a small plane.

Valley between Turquoise Lake and Twin Lakes. Lake Clark National Park

Scheduled flights link Anchorage to Port Alsworth, home to most of the park’s amenities, including several private lodges. Even though there are only a few trails from there, I didn’t encounter any other hiking parties on them. Those trails give access to diverse scenery, ranging from the wide Tanalian Falls, wild Kontrashibuna Lake shore, and expansive views from the top of Tanalian Mountain. However, the park’s backcountry is even more spectacular. The area northwest of Lake Clark offers excellent hiking on a plateau above the tree line where you can easily map your own route in the tundra between Turquoise Lake, Twin Lakes, and Telaquana Lake. Using a charter flight, you can either set up a base camp and go for day hikes or backpack from lake to lake.

The park transitions into summer at the beginning of June. Fall colors appear in the first week of September at higher elevations and last until the end of the month, with new snow covering the peaks by mid-September.

An almost identical version of this article was previously published in final issue of Outdoor Photographer Magazine (June/July 2023). Freelance magazine contracts usually are non-exclusive and based on right of first publication, which means that the author retains ownership but cannot publish materials before the magazine does. Although re-publication is not prohibited, in the past, I have refrained from it, considering it bad form. However, since the magazine is ceasing publication and its website outdoorphotographer.com went dark yesterday, I thought releasing the article here was fair game. If you are missing Outdoor Photographer, this blog’s archive contains a lot of long-form contents worthy of the magazine, see for instance few selected blog highlights. The magazine version of this article included six general tips for avoiding the crowds. However, it extended for 32 pages, which is getting a bit long for a blog post which already exceeds 3,000 words. Instead, I will write an expanded version of those tips in a separate article. Stay tuned!

Summary: My relationship with Outdoor Photography Magazine first as a reader, then a contributor, spanned the entirety of my career in nature photography. As it publishes its final issue which features a 32-page article with my words and photographs, I reflect on the history of the magazine and what happened.

It is rare for a military school to be one of the most elite institutions of higher learning in its country, but such is the case of France’s Ecole Polytechnique. As a student with modest means, I appreciated the status of paid officer cadet very much. Using my newly-received salary, the first major purchase I made was the first autofocus SLR camera, which had just been released. I was far from being aware of it back then – my copy is from eBay, but this time nearly coincided with the release of the premier issue of Outdoor Photographer Magazine in June 1985.

Although not a cover photograph, the main feature of that issue was a nine-page interview with Galen Rowell by Steve Werner. Werner, the magazine’s founder, viewed Rowell as an archetype of his target reader, “a fairly even blend of outdoorsman and photographic artist”. Even though, with his exceptional abilities, Rowell couldn’t really be representative of the average reader, he could be the person they aspired to be. A few years later, my engagement with the mountains and with photography had deepened. Few in France had heard of Rowell. However, a new colleague had freshly arrived from North America to take a position in the lab near Cannes in the French Riviera where I was doing my graduate research. When he showed me Mountain Light, I instantly realized that photographs of mountains could be elevated to an art form. I, too aspired to be Rowell as he became my first role model and shadow mentor in photography and in adventure.

In February of 1993, the now-closed bookstore Black Oak Books on Shattuck Avenue in Berkeley, California held an author event for Galen Rowell, on the occasion of the release of Galen Rowell’s Vision. I had just taken residence in an apartment a few blocks away and learned by chance of the event, from which the signature on my copy dates. The new book consisted of a collection of columns that Galen had previously written for Outdoor Photographer. Barbara Rowell had lamented that magazine publishers tended to take advantage of Galen’s reputation in their first issues before dropping the relationship, but Steve Warner did not make that mistake. Instead, the magazine largely gave free rein to Galen for his column “Photo Adventure”. It was a win for both, as Galen envisioned it from the start as building blocks for a book, while he turned out to be one of the most popular contributors to the magazine. Outdoor Photographer thrived on much of the innovations that were instrumental to Galen’s success: the refinement of the 35mm SLR camera, the emergence of modern outdoor gear, the growth of ecotourism and adventure travel.

Galen was the contributor that got me reading Outdoor Photographer, but he wasn’t the only columnist of distinction. Outstanding regular essayists included luminaries such as Dewitt Jones, Frans Lanting, William Neill and many others from all the disciplines of nature, travel, and adventure photography. Any favorite writers? Bill was particularly influential to me in the late 1990s because his meditative approach provided a counterpoint to Galen’s hyper-active operating mode, and also because he used the tool I was gravitating towards, the large format camera. Recently, he even repeated Galen’s publication model by releasing his inspiring book Light on the Landscape, based on more than 140 columns he wrote in Outdoor Photographer since 1997. The magazine’s editors gave those photographers a forum to write whatever they wanted from the heart, and in turn their excellence made the magazine consistently worth reading. More generally, Outdoor Photographer became the premier photo publication with a focus on the natural world because its contributors were among the most celebrated names in the field.

I therefore felt extremely honored when the magazine published a profile about my work in 2013 and in subsequent years invited me to contribute several major features, often for their summer issue focussed on national parks. The last one, in the June/July 2023 issue, entitled “Top 10 Less-Crowded National Parks” (not my own choice of title), extends for thirty-two pages, representing exactly one-third of the issue’s total number of pages – the longest article I’ve seen in the history of the magazine. Read most of it here. More than half of the images was photographed on 5×7 film. Although summer is my least-favorite season to travel to the parks, the color palette of the images is dominated by greens because it is a summer issue for which I knew not to submit images obviously from other seasons. I am pleased for find myself in the company of the other contributors: William Neill, Amy Gulick, Josh Miller (Yosemite is popular!), Glenn Randall, Eric Bennett, Dave Welling (cover image), and Jason Bradley. This publication is special because, sadly, it is the final issue of Outdoor Photographer. If you have a copy, keep it because it may become a collectible one day! Correct me if I am wrong, but I think Outdoor Photographer was the last (almost) monthly photography magazine in the U.S.

Why is Outdoor Photographer ceasing publication? Much of traditional media has been in decline for years because of the Internet. Companies have decided that electronic advertising options are more promising. There are fewer people willing to pay for high-quality content when there is so much out there for free, even if the quality is a mixed bag. Younger photography enthusiasts who live on the phone do not care for print media. The high point of Outdoor Photographer‘s arc was probably in the 2000s, but by the end of that decade, social media, launched in the mid-2000s and combined with digital photography had decisively changed the Internet and photographic practice. Looking at the issues of the past few years, it was clear that the contents has thinned and the printing quality declined compared to the heydays.

Several excellent digital photography publications more specialized than Outdoor Photographer prosper because they don’t have to depend on the costly logistical challenges of printing and distributing the issues, which alleviates the need for advertising revenue. However, they are not the same as a printed magazine much the same way as a web gallery is a poor substitute for a photography book. Moreover, those younger publications have not yet reached the iconic status of well-established magazines. Back in the 2000s, there were other magazines in the same niche, but Outdoor Photographer was the best of them. As I prepare to move into a new phase, Outdoor Photographer‘s 38-year run spanned the entirety of my career in nature photography.

It is always sad to see the end of an era, but change is inevitable. Accelerating the trend, conglomerates identify distressed media assets, scoop them up to extracting whatever value is left, and kill the rest. Recent years have seen the demise of many influential U.S. publications (U.K.’s seem more resilient), although some survive as websites. They include Popular Photography which lasted 80 years and had at its peak a circulation of a million, Photo District News, the magazine of reference of professional photographers, American Photo, Rangefinder, and Shutterbug. Correct me if I am wrong, but think that <Outdoor Photographer was the last monthly printed photography magazine in the U.S. The magazine had already gone bankrupt in 2015 when it was subsequently sold by Werner Publishing to Madavor Media.

Outdoor Photographer ran again into serious cash flow issues in the second half of 2022 and incurred significant debt, after Madavor was hit with paper shortages and the printer demanded double the contracted price. Again, an acquisition occurred, by the BeBop Channel Corporation in February 2023. Curiously, the new parent company’s revenue is only a small fraction of Madavor Media. With their focus residing on performing arts such as Jazz, dance, and theatre, they appear to have been interested mostly in Madavor Media’s iconic JazzTimes. This erratic move was quickly followed by others. Per their latest media kit, Outdoor Photographer reaches an audience of two million, including 168,000 magazine readers. Many publications are sustained by an order of magnitude fewer readers. Insiders say that Outdoor Photographer by itself was profitable, but dragged down by other Madavor publications. Yet in May, not even attempting to keep the website updated, BeBop laid off all the staff of Madavor Media’s photography publications. This was while they were negotiating the sale of the magazine. They then put up for sale as a $500,000 package not only the now-hollowed Outdoor Photographer, but also Digital Photo Pro, Digital Photo, Image Creators Network, and Imaging Resource. For a moment, it would seem that Giggster Inc, a company in the photography space, would buy all those properties, however, the sale fell through, and in June BeBop filled a lawsuit against Giggster Inc. for breach of contract and fraud.

Contributors were treated no better than staff and subscribers. Despite Bebop’s promises to take care of Madavor’s debt, more than a hundred freelancers remain unpaid. Not only BeBop’s CEO tries to shift the responsibility to the former owners Zilpin Group Inc, encouraging us to sue Zilpin instead of BeBop, he blamed us freelancers for continuing to contribute. Indeed, I was still waiting for an article I delivered in June 2022 to be paid. Yet, when Outdoor Photographer‘s new editor Dan Havlik invited me to contribute to the Summer 2023 issue, I did not hesitate to accept. For many of my magazine articles, I used the riskier publication model of serialization which is kind of the opposite of what Galen Rowell and William Neill did. I first published a book (Treasured Lands) and then extracted material from it for magazine articles. There are always changes and contextualizing to be done, but that’s much less time-consuming than writing an article from scratch. Working with the magazine for a decade with three different editors, I felt a sense of loyalty toward the publication. Having learned much from past issues, I liked an opportunity to pay it forward. Because of how respected the magazine was, I still saw providing articles as an honor.

My thirty-year relationship with Outdoor Photographer Magazine as a reader and then a contributor ends on a simultaneous low and high note. Although I have never worked for free and I am owed thousands of dollars, writing for the magazine was not mainly about money. A main feature in the final issue of the magazine whose premier issue opened with Galen Rowell? Priceless.

Fort Ord National Monument memorializes a former military base and provides an excellent bike recreational trail system. My first visits shortly after its designation in 2012 left me unimpressed, but after multiple return trips, I eventually began to appreciate the subtle but diverse landscape that includes several Central Coast ecosystems.

Barack Obama ended up designating more national monuments than any other U.S. president. His 29 proclamations easily surpass Bill Clinton’s 19 and Theodore Roosevelt’s 18. They also included some very large areas. However, he got started timidly. The first two proclamations consisted of two forts. It is probably not a coincidence that Joe Biden’s first two national monument proclamations, Camp Hale and Castner Range, were also former military properties, or that Donald Trump’s only proclaimed national monument, Camp Nelson, was another one. The first Obama proclamation in 2011 was Fort Monroe, a structure with a storied history, but spanning only about half a square mile. Although his second proclamation in 2012, Fort Ord used to be an Army post, its extent of 23 square miles and almost entirely natural character made it a different kind of national monument.

Army Base Past

In 1917, the U.S. Army bought 23 square miles for a training area initially named Camp Gigling and then Camp Ord. It was used by horse cavalry units until the military started using motorized equipment. Ford Ord received its current name in 1940 when it became a regular Army post. Up to 1.5 million American soldiers received the Army’s “Basic Training” program over the course of the following 50 years. Fort Ord served as a staging facility for troops departing for war, most notably in Vietnam, in the 1950s and 1960s. At one point, more personnel than the neighboring communities of Marina and Monterey put together were stationed on the grounds — 50,000 troops. In 1994, when the base was decommissioned, it totaled 44 square miles.

Although Fort Ord National Monument is cherished for its link to Americans who served their country with honor, nowadays for all practical purposes it is a recreational area and nature parkland. I saw plenty of abandoned Army barracks just outside the monument, but its boundaries appear to have been drawn purposely to exclude them. Besides the many roads that crossroad the monument, some bearing names such as “Machine Gun Flats” or “Engineer Canyon Road”, I discovered a few remnants of the military past inside the monument. Near the intersection of Trail 14 and Trail 19, one of the most interesting was a concrete water through built for the 11th “Blackhorse” Cavalry Regiment stationed at Fort Ord before World War II located near the grave where Comanche, the last ceremonial horse to serve on the fort, was buried with full military honors.

Recreational Area and Nature Preserve Present

Some of the base’s former grounds now host California State University at Monterey Bay, two golf courses, the military Presidio of Monterey Annex, and other developments. However, as a side effect of its military role, the area had largely not been developed and holds some of the last natural wildlands on the Monterey Peninsula. The Fort Ord area is significant due to its abundant biodiversity and significant Central Coast ecosystems, which support a variety of rare and endemic plants and animals. Large stretches of coastal scrub, live oak woodland, and savanna habitat coexist together with unique vernal pools, in a seamless, interconnected landscape. A coastal strip of 1.5 square miles became Fort Ord Dunes State Park in 2009, while the bulk of it came under the Bureau of Land Management administration as Fort Ord National Monument.

The main legacy of the military occupation is the many roads, both paved and unpaved, all closed to motorized traffic. Their extent and generally gentle grade draw bicyclists to the area, making it a mountain biking Mecca of Central California. I was surprised that the entrance areas were so busy even early in the morning. Deep inside the monument, I hardly saw any hikers. It looked like everybody else was riding. For four days in April, the annual Sea Otter Classic, regarded as the world’s largest cycling festival with more than 70,000 participants, takes place at Ford Ord and the adjoining Laguna Seca Racetrack. Probably not the best time to visit if you are hoping for quiet. Fort Ord is not all about roads, though. There are so many trails, 96 of them, that, unlike the roads, they are numbered rather than named. It would seem that the locals view the monument as a recreational area rather than a nature preserve. The grassroots “friends” association, named Fort Ord Recreation Trails Friends, did not reply to my natural history questions.

Georeferenced PDF maps: High-res version of above, More legible trail map

About half of the monument on the west side is still closed to the public while it is subject to clean-up work for munitions and soil pollution – Ford Ord remains a Superfund site. On the east side, there are two main entrances with sizable parking lots and bathrooms, both off Highway 68 southwest of Salinas, the Creekside Terrace Entrance, and the Badger Hills Entrance. In addition, there are trailheads with smaller parking areas along the north side.

Creekside Terrace

The Creekside Terrace trailhead in the northeast offered an excellent introduction to the monument’s diversity. Following a narrow trail uphill, I first crossed a grove of mature live oaks draped with lichen. At the top of a sandstone outcrop, I enjoyed a vast panorama over the rolling hills and rare native central maritime chaparral habitat. In places, the erosion of the sandstone bedrock created sharp cliff formations reminiscent of Torrey Pines State Preserve near San Diego. Hiking further led to a sizable pool. From there, I returned via Station One Rd and Trail 1, which provided views of the Salinas Valley.

Badger Hills

Badger Hills in the southeast is the main entrance to the monument, located off eight miles south of Salinas off Highway 68. From there, I followed a loop consisting of Guidotti Road, Skyline Road, Oil Well Road, and Toro Creek Road. According to Alltrails.com, the 6-mile hike (730 feet elevation gain) is the most popular in the monument. That side of Fort Ord consists of grass-covered gently rolling hills dotted with sparse clusters of oak trees. The open grassland terrain provided wide-ranging views in all directions, but no shade. I had been told that this area, especially in the vicinity of the Laguna Seca Racetrack, is the best in the monument for wildflowers starting in May. Maybe because of the growth of grasses, the blooms that stood out most on the hills were the tall sky lupines growing in dense patches. A different plant community with water-loving trees such as sycamores thrived along the flat portion of the trail bordering a subdivision. It is best to hike in this area on weekdays because, during the weekend, the roar of the vehicles from the racetrack distracts from the quiet of nature.

Jerry Smith Corridor

In contrast with the open hills of the southeastern part of the monument, its northwestern part is an upland mesa dominated by groves of coast live oaks. If it feels like a hobbit forest full of twisted ancient trees, it is because the roots cannot penetrate the sandstone strata, therefore limiting the trees in height. Bicyclists park at the east end of Gigling Road in Marina, but for hikers, the quicker access is via the small Jerry Smith Corridor trailhead along the Inter-Garrison Road slightly east of Schooner Road.

The Jerry Smith Corridor leads past Watkins Gate Road to a vernal pool bordered by reeds. A welcome sight after years of dryness, it is one of the 45 vernal pools in the monument that were brimming with life as a result of an unusually wet rainy season in 2023. Most of them are located in the northwestern part of the monument. The federally threatened California Tiger Salamander and the Contra Costa Goldfields are two examples of the flora and fauna thriving in the habitat created when such seasonal lakes fill natural depressions. The ponds are also crucial components of the local environment serving as stops for migratory birds. The satellite view from Google Maps shows them totally dry, which is the case in the summer of drought years.

I previously didn’t pay too much attention to the national monument closest to my home in San Jose because I thought of it as a recreational area memorializing a former military base. Walking the roads appeared a bit tedious as the views were not even as spectacular as those from some Bay Area county parks. However, by returning several times, especially during springtime, I found that a closer look revealed a very worthy nature preserve with interesting biodiversity.

I am honored that three of my images have been selected by the U.S. Postal Service to be part of the new commemorative stamp series “Waterfalls”, released today, June 13, 2023.

The new postage series (on sale here) which pays homage to the variety and beauty of American waterfalls, is released by the U.S. Postal Service as a panel set of twelve forever stamps. Each stamp features a photograph with the name of the waterfall and the state in which it is located beneath it. In 2016, one of my photographs had been featured on a stamp panel, but this time, I am even more honored that I am the only one among the nine photographers included in the series to have three images selected for the project.

As reported by the Los Angeles Times, one of the images depicts Nevada Fall flanked by Liberty Cap in Yosemite National Park. If you compare the NPS photo in the LA Times article to mine, you’ll see that even for such an iconic scene, how one approaches composition still matters. It was also the most favorable light and weather conditions that I experienced on my repeated visits to the Mist Trail, which is Yosemite’s signature hike. Despite the popularity of the trail, getting drenched by the namesake mist from the waterfalls and walking through rainbows always brings me a sense of untamed wildness. Because of the relationship I have developed with Yosemite, it is my favorite among all national parks. As Yosemite Valley is loaded with photographic lineage from Carleton Watkins to Ansel Adams, I tried to find unmediated inspiration from the landscape and my sense of awe.

Each year, the USPS issues a Stamp Yearbook. The collectible hardcover book contains sketches, design explorations, and reference materials from the stamp creation process. Insights from stamp designers, artists, photographers, and art directors provide behind-the-scenes glimpses into how stamps are made in the U.S. I am honored that the 2023 Stamp Yearbook will feature my photograph of Nevada Fall and a quote from me.

Click on image to enlarge

It is always special to photograph a waterfall because I am capturing something perpetually in motion to make an image frozen in time forever, an eminently photographic act. The second stamp depicts Waimoku Falls in Haleakala National Park, Hawaii. It is maybe the most beautiful waterfall on the island of Maui and certainly the tallest one accessible on foot, at the end of the Pipiwai Trail – possibly the best hike on the whole island of Maui. I scrambled precariously on the hill to the right of the falls so that I could point the camera straight – with the aid of a special adjustment on my large-format camera – to maintain the cliff’s verticality in the photograph. Together with the tight framing excluding the waterfall’s brink and outlet pool, this created the impression of an endless sheer wall of green, although the waterfall is “only” 400 feet tall.

The third stamp depicts Dark Hollow Falls in Shenandoah National Park, Virginia. It seems that most visitors equate the park with its main artery, Skyline Drive. However, it was leaving the road and walking that let me experience the real beauty of the place. The waterfalls are a good example. To see them, you have to hike downhill from Skyline Drive—and then uphill back! The easiest-to-reach waterfall is Dark Hollow Falls. On my first visit there, I thought that sunny conditions created less than ideal light, but I embraced them in creating an off-kilter composition. It sharply contrasts with the graphic simplicity of the previous stamp. Afterward, I was glad I made that photograph, as it turned out to be more dynamic than those I made of the same waterfall on a return trip.

Stamps are miniature works of art that tell the best story of America. If you are curious about how “the marvelous process of creating stamps is a marvel in and of itself”, refer to the long-form article The Extraordinary Design Journey of a Stamp—From Quasi-Secret Society to Perforated Perfection. Here is a quote from USPS Director of Stamp Services William Gicker:

… stamps are, at the end of the day, a limited security of the United States government. They’re like currency, but for limited use. But unlike currency, we get to celebrate our culture through them. Currency still has presidents, and that’s pretty much it. We get to highlight other parts of our culture, both people and events and things. It’s exciting to have it out there. But at the same time, we only do about 24 issues a year, so it’s still very limited. Considering we receive about 30,000 suggestions a year, we only do about 24—and maybe that’s even a little bit high. So it’s still quite an honor and quite a distinction to actually be on a stamp.

I never submitted anything but instead was contacted by an agency that works with the USPS. Like in almost all image licensing transactions, the payment consists of a one-time licensing fee, which is rather modest considering the 35 million copies, rather than royalties. But there are not many media that will provide a larger print run for a photograph! More importantly, as stamps are a collectible portion of the nation’s historical records, I am grateful for the incredible honor to be – again – a small part of America’s national identity.

The April trip to Japan and its aftermath made me miss the California wildflower season, which due to the winter’s abundant rains, was a super bloom. In early May, figuring out that Southern California would be long past peak, I went on pursuit of wildflowers in Northern California. The northern part of the state doesn’t have famed wildflowers areas such as Antelope Valley or Carrizo Plain, but I thought that my best chance beyond the Bay Area would be in Berryessa Snow Mountain National Monument and adjacent areas. The official Bureau of Land Management (BLM) signage for the monument should not prominently include California poppies for nothing, right?

Zim Zim Fall

Tuyelome (pronounced too-lee-OME-ee) is a grassroots conservation organization working in the Northern Inner Coast Range of California that was instrumental in the establishment of Berryessa Snow Mountain National Monument. Its name is a Lake Miwok Indian word that means “deep home place”. Nate Lillge from Tuyelome, who had authored the introduction for Berryessa-Snow Mountain National Monument in Our National Monuments suggested wildflower areas. The pictures from a hike he had led to Zim Zim Fall looked promising, as California poppies carpeted the slopes even on that dry year. I picked up that hike for my first destination.

From the west shore of Lake Berryessa, I turned onto the Berryessa-Knoxville Road, which is always a delight to drive if you take your time. The quintessential backroad, it is narrow and windy, but also remarkably quiet and beautiful. The pavement was even rougher than I remembered it, with so many deep potholes that it required the same precautions as an unpaved road. By the time I got to the trailhead, a small pullout on the east side of the road 24 miles later, I had not seen a single other vehicle. Berryessa Snow Mountain National Monument is a patchwork of state and federal lands under the supervision of a medley of agencies. The Zim Zim Fall hike takes place on lands that are managed by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.

The trail starts on the west side of the road beyond a green gate. I quickly reached a creek crossing. Since I read that there were a lot of them (I would count ten), I did not attempt to keep my shoes dry by stepping precariously on rocks, but instead walked straight into the streambed. When I got to the second crossing, I was glad for my prior decision, since this time, there was no way not to get wet feet. After the wet winter, the stream level was probably higher than average. Fortunately, unlike when I hiked the Paria Canyon, the temperature was moderate enough that my wet feet were not uncomfortable, and I felt no need to change socks. The stream crossings added a little adventurous note to the easy hike.

The trail is an old ranching road that follows the Zim Zim Creek along a gentle valley, crossing meadows below rolling hills. While at no point the wildflowers were dense enough to form a carpet, I found a few nice-looking patches, which is enough for a photograph. The grass was a lush green. Was it outgrowing the flowers? Or was I past peak?

About three miles from the trailhead, the trail makes a sharp right turn and starts gaining elevation more steeply – if you continue straight, tough bushwhacking takes you to the base of Zim Zim Fall. As the official trail traverses the side of the valley opposite the waterfall, excellent distant views are available. The waterfall faces East and is sunlit in the morning.

Half a mile after the turn, a single-track trail leads steeply down to the base of the waterfall. As the main trail continues to gain elevation, views over the Zim Zim Creek Valley open up. I hiked to a saddle about four miles from the trailhead (elevation gain 800 feet). From there, it is possible to come back along a ridge for a loop, but since I had not checked out the waterfall’s base, I backtracked instead. By that time, the weather had turned cloudy, and it was dark enough that stopping down to f/11 and using ISO 50 was enough to slow the shutter speed down to 1/20 seconds to smooth the water. At least, I didn’t carry the tripod for nothing. Zim Zim Fall is one of the most accessible, year-round waterfalls in Berryessa Snow Mountain National Monument. Although I did not find a super bloom, the hike turned out to be very rewarding. Maybe it was because it was a weekday, but by the time I returned to the trailhead, I hadn’t seen a single person. It was only after the Berryessa-Knoxville Road turned into the better-maintained Morgan Valley Road at a pass marking the monument’s boundary that I encountered other cars on the road.

Indian Valley and Walker Ridge

North of CA-20, the character of the monument changes, as shrubs and conifer forests replace grassy oak lands. The unpaved Walker Ridge Road is the best road in the monument for panoramic vistas, offering terrific views across barrens, including Mt. Diablo, the Sierra Nevada, Mt. Shasta, and Mt. St. Helena. At a closer distance, the monument’s namesake Snow Mountain, as well as Indian Valley Reservoir are prominent. Walker Ridge Road starts on the north side of CA-20, about 12.5 miles from the junction with CA-53 to the west or 6.2 miles from the junction with CA-16 to the east. The last time I drove with a Subaru, I found Walker Ridge Road well-graded and quite easy. It could be because this time I came with a Prius, which has some of the lowest clearance of any sedan, or it could be that the road had degraded due to the abundant winter rains of the 2022-23 winter, but this time, although I had no issues, I needed to drive with great care. The few other people I encountered all drove high-clearance 4WD vehicles.

About 5.2 miles from CA-20, a secondary road leads west towards Indian Valley Reservoir, a large artificial lake offering recreational activities such as boating and fishing. Its 300,000 acres fall within the larger Indian Valley/Walker Ridge Recreation Area. I found the road closed before reaching the Indian Valley Reservoir Campground. About a mile and a half up the road, the Blue Oaks Camp offered 6 campsites with picnic tables, fire pits and vault toilets, but no water. Pulling into the campground and intending to go to sleep early, I was wary of the other campers’ music, and instead drove down the road again.

Unlike in national parks, dispersed camping outside of official campgrounds is generally permitted in national monuments. I found a nice pullout overlooking the lake where previous occupants had built a fire ring. While the water was boiling for my dinner, I made a few night exposures. The sky, which had been cloudy for most of the day, had cleared and the moonlit scene was rendered by the camera similarly to a daylight scene with a few stars. To render them as points with a 24mm f/2.8 lens, I kept the exposure to 10s, resulting in a ISO of 800. I tried out the new AI-based noise reduction available in Lightroom 12.3, and it did an excellent job, easily as good as the specialized Topaz DeNoise. Since it is included in Lightroom, give it a try if you haven’t yet! Hopeful for good light at sunrise, I went to bed cowboy-style, sleeping on the ground rather than inside my cramped car. The forecast had called for mostly cloudy weather, but no rain. Half an hour before sunrise, I was awakened by raindrops. I retreated into the car and went back to sleep, regretting not having taken advantage of the moonlight and window of clear early night sky to make more compositions.

After the rain stopped, I walked down the closed road to the campground, which is quite large and ideally located at the lakeshore. Right at the water’s edge, I found a few clusters of California poppies. Although far from spectacular, they were still the best I had found in the monument. However, it was still early in the morning and quite chilly, so the flowers had not opened.

I drove back to Walker Ridge Road, and not far from the junction with the Indian Valley Reservoir Road, I started a hike on the east side of the road to explore the serpentine barrens on foot. Serpentine is a rare bluish-green rock derived from the earth’s mantle. Soils formed from serpentine rocks lack certain elements required by most plants, prompting adaptations resulting in species not found anywhere else.

The area has two prominent rock formations called Signal Rock and Eagle Rock that can be both visited via a loop of about 8 miles. It was a bit confusing because of a large number of intersecting trails of various widths, some narrow single-tracks, and others jeep roads. I was glad that I had a GPS app. The terrain was definitively not a good place to look for wildflowers. Upon arriving at Signal Rock, I was unimpressed by the formation, but before leaving, I decided to do a scrambling circumnavigation to see what I could find.

From its other side, the rock loomed more impressively, and I saw a few clusters of sunflowers. It is very rare that I set my 12-24 zoom at its widest setting, but that was one of the occasions that called for such a radical perspective, as it would make the sunflowers prominent enough in the photograph to give it life by contrasting them against the dark rock and creating a Z-shaped visual path leading up to the otherwise modest pinnacle.

I didn’t find anything close to super bloom I was looking for, but I had met the secondary goal of my trip, which was to find out what the proposed Molok Luyuk (“Condor Ridge” in the Patwin language, as provided by the Yocha Dehe Wintun Nation) addition to Berryessa Snow Mountain National Monument was about. Walker Ridge Road, Signal Rock, and Eagle Rock are currently adjacent to the monument, but not included within. The Berryessa Snow Mountain National Monument Expansion Act introduced in the Senate on March 7, 2023 aims to change that by adding nearly 4,000 acres to the 330,000-acres national monument. Even without the native cultural concerns, given how spectacular the views on Walker Ridge Road are and how rare are serpentine habitats, this is well overdue! Protecting this habitat will also help biodiversity and conserve a wildlife corridor. You can voice your support here.

click on map for larger version

We joke that if my wife had a haircut, I would not be able to recognize her. But I did well in identifying Lee Friedlander. His facial features had not changed that much since the year 1994 when he took his self-portrait in Tokyo, which was prominently displayed in the gallery. Besides, he was the only person wearing photography equipment. What appeared to be a small 35mm film camera hung around his neck, fitting for such a voracious photographer. I was wearing my trusty F-stop Gear backpack that must have weighed thirty pounds as usual, but there were no cameras inside.

The Fraenkel Gallery in San Francisco on that day held an opening reception for the exhibit Lee Friedlander Framed by Joel Coen. Friedlander is of course one of the few greatest living photographers, his career spanning more than sixty years. His work is the subject of more than fifty books, and they keep coming up, with two titles already announced for 2024. Ansel Adams is associated with wild landscapes, Cartier-Bresson with street photographs, Avedon with portraits, and other greats are mostly known for a limited range of subjects, but remarkably, Friedlander has made his mark on almost every genre of photography. Unlike other contemporary photographers, his oeuvre includes an extensive body of work on the natural world which is quite distinctive. How did he pull that off? Mostly with a highly peculiar, chaotic, and off-kilter sense of composition that can be viewed as his signature style. The exhibit highlights Friedlander’s signature compositions through a curation that draws connections between images through their formal elements and framing. Joel Coen, the curator, is not unfamiliar with slanted visions of America that uncover the mysterious within the ordinary. With his brother Ethan, he is one of the two Coen Brothers whose films include classics such as Fargo (1996) and No Country for Old Men (2007). I wondered if I would be able to learn something about Friedlander’s way of seeing through the new selection.

When it comes to famous photographers, I am an admitted groupie. For more than fifteen years, I have been attending gallery openings, lectures, photography fairs, and book signings to meet admired artists. I collect photography in the form of books rather than prints. Except for rare hand-made “artist books”, they are mass-produced. Therefore, I feel that a signature, which comes from the hand of the artist, helps confer them the status of art objects. While I buy signed books – and also go out of my way to make available my books signed for those who care – I much prefer to receive a signature directly from the artist. I once read on Jeffrey Ladd’s blog that upon discovering on eBay copies of books he had signed the day before, Joseph Koudelka was disgusted and vowed not to do any book signings again. Since then, I always ask for an inscription. It lowers the resale value but provides a memento of a brief connection. Sometimes, they are a simple “To QT”. Other occasions were more surprising, such as when Alec Soth made witty sketches in each of the books I brought, or when Paul Caponigro wrote a thank you note for coming to his lecture.

In 2015, my daughter was already developing an interest in the arts. I had made my way to the Fraenkel Gallery with her in tow. After we looked for the French conceptual photographer Sophie Calle without success, I assumed that she had disappeared into the private spaces of the gallery, maybe to meet with collectors. Not wanting to exceed the patience of a ten-year-old, we left. On Saturday, May 5, 2023, coming by myself shortly after the official beginning of the reception, I was determined to hang out for as long as it would take. But it didn’t take long to locate Friedlander. I introduced myself, expressed my admiration, and thinking that it would be a busy afternoon for him, quickly asked if he would sign books. With a faint smile, he said that he couldn’t because he had to go somewhere. Indeed, he quickly moved into the gallery’s backrooms.

I went back to looking at the work on the walls, trying to understand Joel Coen’s choices. Three of the walls were adorned with just three prints each, whereas the bulk of the exhibit was a salon-style assemblage of prints stacked up to three rows. Some of the common formal structures, such as the splitting by posts or the use of frames were easy to spot, but maybe because of the hanging order, others eluded me until I watched in a second room a slide show put together by Coen that made the formal relationships crystal clear. Besides its sequencing and grouping of images, the slide show also presented key examples not part of the exhibit, which had about 45 prints. Coen had remained in the public room of the gallery, and after expressing my appreciation for divulging the logic behind his curation, we had a personable conversation. Among other things, he mentioned that Friedlander didn’t like crowds, which I could certainly sympathize with.

Guessing that Friedlander would not reappear for a while, I took a walk through the building. Remembering how the 49 Geary building, one block from Union Square, was a thriving art gallery complex with about twenty different galleries, I was shocked to discover that the building was largely empty. I knew that Themes and Projects (formerly Modernbook) had long left the building. I missed their owners who were so generous with advice when my wife and I had briefly operated an art gallery at the Bergamot Station in Santa Monica – the other long-established West Coast gallery complex. Robert Koch Gallery was still hanging in there but had to move to a smaller space. In total, only five galleries were left. Elsewhere in San Francisco, the acclaimed Pier 24 museum/collection is closing, also because of the high rent. Maybe like in other industries, only the top do well. Fraenkel is the top photography dealer on the West Coast, and the event shows why he has earned his reputation. I was grateful that they kept doing exhibits and public receptions rather than turn into a by-appointment-only affair.

Back to the Fraenkel Gallery, I studied some favorites more. Out of curiosity, I looked at the price list, where a wide disparity – $9,500 to $35,000 – was in evidence. Certainly, it wasn’t correlated to print size, nor could be explained by edition numbers since Friedlander is one of the rare photographers of his caliber not to limit prints. It seemed like the more valuable prints were the older ones in terms of printing year rather than capture year, with a bonus added when those two dates were close to each other. I lingered in a third room consisting of prints by other gallery artists that used some of the same formal devices as the Friedlander photographs. I leafed through the just-released exhibit catalog and found out that its sequencing followed exactly the slide-show, and included all the additional images not on display, for a total of about 70 plates. Some Friedlander monographs may benefit from a tighter edit, but in this Coen did a perfect selection. It was difficult to resist buying such a beautifully printed book (I am still having second thoughts), but the reason I was lugging my Fstop Gear Satori was that it was the smallest bag I had that would fit my collection of Friedlander books, including the oversize The American Monument and the (too?) massive MOMA 2005 retrospective. I realized that in bringing all of them, I had been overly greedy, so after Friedlander re-emerged, this time I asked if he would sign just one book. He replied “No. I am finished for today.”

At first, I was disappointed. In fifteen years, nobody had denied me a signature. The “worst” was when the Gagosian Gallery didn’t allow inscription requests to William Eggleston, who on that day seemed to require much encouragement to continue the book signing. There are plenty of signed Friedlander books on the market. But I subsequently remembered reading from Maria Friedlander that back when he was self-publishing his seminal Self-Portrait (1970), although a gallery was his best customer for the books, he had refused to sign them, resulting in discontinued orders. I thought that at age 88, he must have felt tired by the event, especially if he had felt obligated towards Jeffrey Fraenkel. Their relationship dates from the early 1980s, when he was the second artist exhibited by Fraenkel – the first was Carleton Watkins whose photographs Fraenkel acquired by bidding against the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It had led to such beautiful books for all to enjoy, of which Lee Friedlander Framed by Joel Coen is only the latest. Lee and Maria Friedlander had been married since 1958, before I was born. My two favorite images in the exhibit were two unconventional portraits of her – Maria, Southwestern United States (1969) and Maria Friedlander, Las Vegas, Nevada (1970). As they exited the gallery, I was touched to see them constantly holding hands. After all, I didn’t go home empty handed.

P.S. Signed copies of Lee Friedlander Framed by Joel Coen are available from Photo-eye for $150. Previous signed books available from Haywire Press, a partnership between Friedlander and his grandson, Giancarlo T. Roma.

During a recent stay in Tokyo, I discovered a different side of the metropolis, only an hour away from its urban core. Though popular with the locals, the island of Enoshima would be easy to miss. It just unfamiliar and quirky enough to make a trip here – easily done in a day – feel like a world away from the city.

Despite its small size of about 4km in circumference, Enoshima Island offers multi-faceted attractions. The island has a modern side with a yacht harbor that has hosted the sailing events for two Olympic Games (1964 and 2021) and the Enoshima Island Spa, a hot springs establishment. However, most of the sights are on a forested hill that can be explored only on foot, via a network of stairs, walkways, and illuminated (paid) escalators.

Learning about the mythology that surrounds its history enhanced my appreciation of the island, as the story served a a common thread for the places visited. Kokei, a Buddhist monk, recorded island lore concerning its beginnings around 1047. The enormous five-headed dragon Gozuryu tormented the town of Koshigoe for a millennium. A heavenly maiden, the goddess Benzaiten (or Benten), descended from the clouds following ferocious storms and terrible earthquakes. A mystery island – Enoshima – appeared from the depths just as she reached the water’s surface; this island would become her home. The Gozuryu adored her at first sight and requested her hand in marriage. However, Benzaiten was aware of the dragon’s misdeeds and informed him that she would only consider his proposal if he made a promise to reform its ways. Gozuryu then committed himself to guarding the territory he had previously ravaged. The dragon eventually transformed into a hill so that he could continue to protect the godess even after his death. As a result of this legend, Enoshima is a special location for weddings. In modern times, the Bell of the Dragon was erected on the island. Lovers who fasten a padlock to the gate and ring the bell are said to be forever together, much like the two deities in the legend.

According to history, Enoshima Shrine’s origins date back to 552. The Hojo clan, which ascended to power during the Kamakura period (1185–1333), places great value on the temple. Legend has it that when Hojo Tokimasa, the first regent of the Kamakura shogunate, allegedly went to the shrine to pray for prosperity, a mystery woman (Benzaiten) gave him a prophecy. Tokimasa decided to use the three dragon scales she left behind as his family’s coat of arms. Because of the island’s connection to this most enigmatic of animals, dragons dragons are everywhere on the island. Although I did not try to photograph all the instances, it was fun to try to spot them. The Enoshima Shrine is composed of multiple structures. There are three main ones, Hetsunomiya, Nakatsunomiya, and Okutsunomiya, and a number of smaller ones spread all over the island.

Historical records state that the initial shrine was erected on the island’s backside, where erosion had cut out the Enoshima Iwaya caves, which have significant historical value. Older locals who grew up in the region recall how no one dared risk venturing inside the caves; only the brave would even dare to get near them. Nowadays, two of the caves are open to the public, leading respectively to the birthplace of Enoshima Shrine and to a gaudily illuminated statue of the dragon Gozuryu.

Enoshima had already grown to be a popular destination for pilgrims and worshipers by the Edo Period (1603-1868). Today, although foreign tourists do not show up in large numbers as the island is not considered a major travel attraction, it is touristy and busy all the time with local visitors – the kind of place I like to check out when traveling abroad because of their fun, relaxed and often quirky atmosphere. There is some measure of authenticity, yet a foreign visitor with a camera does not stick out. Right at the island’s entrance, after a bronze tori gate, souvenirs and all sorts of local food delicacies are offered on bustling Nakamise Street. The most popular appeared to be tako senbei, a rice cracker made by pressing a whole octopus flat.

By contrast, the top of the island is capped by the serene Samuel Cocking garden which contains a variety of flowers, tropical trees and modern sculptures. It was named after a British merchant who owned the area in the 19th century. Rising from the garden, the Sea Candle is a 60-meter tall lighthouse that doubles as a 360-degree panoramic observation platform. It is said to offer an excellent view of Mt Fuji on clear days, but I visited on a rainy day. Except for those views, I was actually pleased with the soft light of the day that worked better for most subjects than a sunny would have. I had no trouble to keep my camera dry thanks to an umbrella I purchased at a souvenir shop for less than $5.

With the mix of the spiritual and the kitsch, the ancient and the modern, and of nature and man-made, I found that the island packed a lot in a relatively small area. Surprisingly, Enoshima Island is only about an hour from central Tokyo (Katase Enoshima) and as such makes for a great excursion away from the city. Enoshima Island is part of Fujisawa, a coastal city that serves as a beach resort also popular for surfing and sailing. Its Enoshma Aquarium is one of the most popular in Japan, with outstanding displays showcasing the marine life of the adjacent Sagami Bay and beyond. Most visit Enoshima Island as a day trip, but for a more relaxed experience, we stayed overnight at a ryokan minutes from the train station and from the bridge to the island.

Earth Day is a global event celebrated every year today, April 22nd. It is a day to raise awareness about environmental issues and take action toward creating a more sustainable future. Since National Park Week is held in conjunction with Earth Day, given my longtime association with public parklands, in past years, I have taken the occasion to celebrate our national parks. This year’s post is instead about a specific urban space, People’s Park in Berkeley, California.

The presence of nature close to where we live provides numerous benefits to our well-being. While distant and large protected areas such as national parks, national monuments, and wilderness areas are essential for conservation, it is local green areas that provide opportunities for people to connect with nature on a regular basis, thus contributing to community well-being. They are essential for promoting physical and mental health through exposure to nature. They play a part in environmental sustainability by filtering pollutants and reducing heat island effects and carbon emissions. They help sustain biodiversity and can provide local food sources.

One such local green area is People’s Park, south of the University of California (UC) campus in Berkeley. Its history well-detailed in the Wikipedia, and recognized by a National Register of Historic Places designation is closely tied to the anti-war, civil rights, and counter-culture movements of the 1960s. Yet, almost by its nature, it has always been a precarious and contested place.

Upon acquiring the 2.8-acre piece of land by eminent domain and clearing it, the University had plans to build student housing and a parking lot, but due to a funding shortage, the site had remained in a destitute state. On April 20, 1969, following a call in the community newspaper Berkeley Barb to beautify and utilize the vacant lot, a hundred people came and began to lay sod. Within a month, community members and activists built a green public park where free speech could flourish. The anniversary of the People’s Park therefore roughly coincides with Earth Day – which first took place on April 22, 1970.

In the 1960s, the University was the birthplace of the Free Speech Movement and a center of student activism. Ronald Regan had been elected governor in 1966 by riding the backlash against it with the promise to “clean up the mess in Berkeley”. He considered the creation of the leftist park a direct challenge to the property rights of the university, of which he already disapproved the tolerance of anti-war student demonstrations. On May 15, 1969, a day remembered as “Bloody Thursday”, workers accompanied by police armed with tear gas and shotguns loaded with birdshot were sent to tear down and fence the park. In the ensuing violent attack on the large crowd of protesters, a man was killed and many seriously injured. The Governor called a National Guard force of 2,700 with helicopters and tanks that subsequently occupied Berkeley for two weeks. However, after another protest, the Berkeley City Council voted to lease the park site from the university in 1972, officializing the status of the park.

Like the battle for conservation in the words of John Muir, the battle for People’s Park has been never-ending. Over the years, the park has faced numerous challenges and threats of closure, but it has remained a vital community space and a hub for activism and social justice. It was home to a natural stormwater management system, a communal vegetable garden, and various activities such as art classes, film screenings, concerts, dances, and cookouts. In a context of gentrification, community members and activists have fought to protect the park from development and commercialization, and it continues to serve as a space where people could hang out for community support, engagement, education, and advocacy.

Upon arriving in America, I lived for three years in Berkeley. Having fond memories of this time, I kept following news about the city. I read about the latest development plans from the University of California, and the resulting protests and legal challenges. Finding myself in Berkeley at the beginning of this month to help with a field trip for the school my son is attending, I took the opportunity to pay a visit to People’s Park. It had been a long time since I last set foot there. Still, I remembered a thriving urban woodland. I was shocked to find the space sparsely forested and littered with many felled tree trunks that included a large palm tree and several redwoods. Graffiti-scrawled heavy machinery was stationed, as well as several tents housing homeless residents.

For decades, the camera has spurred me to see more of the world. After attending a BBQ dinner with the school group at Cesar Chavez Park near the Berkeley Marina, I returned to Telegraph Avenue and strolled around to look for photographs. At first, I hesitated to walk into the park at dusk, as it appeared forlorn and dark. However, I heard a young woman cheerfully calling for people to get a meal if they were hungry. I was not feeling satiated since the school BBQ dinner didn’t have much vegetarian food, and I also wanted to strike up a conversation to find out what was happening to the park. Once a week, Chloe and Alyn buy groceries from donated food stamps and cook at Ames’ Southside Kitchen – UC Berkeley cut off water and electricity to the kitchen structure located on the park – and roll the warm meal on a cart to People’s Park in the evening. Ximena, a local reporter, came later to interview the activists.

I learned from the conversation that the current threat to the park, a construction project announced in 2018, was the most serious in its history since Bloody Thursday. Its goal is to build housing for up to 1,100 students and supportive housing for 100 low-income people – that the activists dismiss as being too expensive to be useful. The ostensively liberal Berkeley City Council seems to agree with the University’s plans. The park’s ecosystem was most recently damaged in the summer of 2022 when backed by yet another contingent of police in riot gear, the University illegally cut down about 50 trees in the middle of the night.

Authorities have deliberately allowed the park to deteriorate to garner public support for its destruction. For instance, a water pipe issue was left unfixed so that the park had no water supply for weeks, the doors of the bathroom shut were welded shut, and lights were turned off, making the site hazardous for elderly residents and unwelcoming for visitors. If students stayed away from People’s Park because it appears a scary place as it did for me at first, they would not become part of the park’s constituency or learn about the plight of its users.

Chloe and Alyn had kept the meat separated from the delicious vegetables. I shared the free home-cooked meal with two residents. One of them offered pot that I politely declined. Sitting in the friendly company of those strangers, I was glad that I didn’t let the first impressions keep me away. Since my daughter had applied to UC Berkeley, I could personally understand the University’s desire for extended enrolment and need for student housing. Yet, there are nine alternative sites on which they could start building right away without opposition, so why the instance on reclaiming People’s Park? Indeed, as reported on People’s Park website, in the latest decision in the legal fight, the Appeals Court found in February 2023 that UC’s Environmental Impact Report did not adequately analyze feasible alternative sites. Unlike others, People’s Park is a historic landmark, and a well-established center for mutual aid. University officials must have felt that such an unruly and (currently) unsightly place a few blocks away from the prestigious campus was a nuisance, but I felt a liveliness absent from the neat suburb where I live.

In keeping with today’s occasion, People’s Park is one of the last green spaces in the most densely populated Berkeley neighborhood. Due to the abundant rains of the year, a profusion of wildflowers of all colors was blooming. I imagined how, with a bit of care and attention, the place could become again a beautiful public commons, whereas once an open space is gone, it is lost forever. Don’t we all need more, not less open space?

With its live oak and chaparral-covered foothills, Almaden Quicksilver County Park, located minutes from the suburbs of San Jose, at first resembles the other nature preserves ringing the Silicon Valley. However, at their height, mercury mining operations that took place there (quicksilver is another name for mercury) made the site the second-most productive mercury mine in the world, yielding nearly 84 million pounds. Starting in 1847 and for three decades, it may have been the nation’s most significant mineral resource, as it was essential in producing explosives for the Civil War and in amalgamating gold during the California Gold Rush. Carleton Watkins, arguably the most important landscape photographer in history, documented the site quite extensively.

Back then, 1,800 miners and their families lived in the area, but almost nothing remains of the structures that housed them. A number of mining structures still stand, of which the Almaden Quicksilver Chimney is one of the most prominent. Starting from the Hacienda Trailhead where a rusted collection of mining equipment is on display, sitting on a hill and surrounded by trees, the chimney quickly comes to view. Built in the 1870’s, it was used to release dangerous sulfur fumes from the Hacienda reduction works below.

Despite the fact that much of the region is now covered with thicker vegetation than in the 19th century, there are still numerous traces of the once-active mining hub. The most impressive is the rotary furnace that was built in 1940 to provide mercury for munitions during World War II and remained active until 1976, when mining operations ceased at the site. More than 100 abandoned mine entrances can be found in the park, together with sporadic pieces of machinery, foundations, and deteriorating roads that have left a lasting impression on the landscape. For safety, all of them have been sealed, with the exception of the San Cristobal Mine. I read that it was possible to enter the tunnel for a short distance, but was disappointed to see the entrance closed with a grid. Perhaps if I couldn’t enter the dark passage to experience what I imagined to be heavy and humid air, I could at least take a picture to remember this quick peek into the past?

While it was possible to insert a phone lens in the interstices, the grid pattern was only about half an inch, much smaller than any full camera lens front element. I knew right away that I would put to good use the automated focus bracketing of my new Sony A7R5 camera. Not only focusing manually a stack would have been quite tedious, but also the camera support was less than rock solid. In order to blur the grid to the largest possible extent, I had placed the lens as close as possible by resting its front against the grid, with the two other support points provided by two tripod legs. Touching the camera to re-focus would have risked minute changes in the camera position or lens focal length.

To illustrate how I made it work, first here is a picture taken with a 35mm focal length at the f/11 aperture I would normally use to ensure front-to-back sharpness. One can see how to tight grid pattern strongly intrudes into the picture, which is not especially desirable because the grid is contemporary.

35mm, f/11

As the aperture is opened up, the grid gradually gets thrown out of the depth-of-field area of the lens and starts to fade, but even at the lens widest aperture of f/4, it still remained quite visible.

35mm, f/8

35mm, f/5.6

35mm, f/4

Depth of field is inversely proportional to the square of the focal length, so by framing the tunnel more tightly, with a 60mm focal length, the depth of field is much diminished.

60mm, f/11

60mm, f/8

60mm, f/5.6

60mm, f/4

By f/4, the grid is sufficiently out of the depth of field area that it has become almost invisible. However, the shallow depth of field also means that only a slice of the scene, the traverse planks with the words, appears in focus. The solution is to do a focus stack with each of the component images captured at f/4. Even though the closest element of the scene, the plank at the top of the photo, is not that close, getting everything in focus still required 36 frames. Stacking them with Helicon Focus led to the final image after a few quick processing steps in Lightroom.

Focus stacking is normally used to extend the depth of field. In this example, I used it to selectively reduce it, which had the effect of making the unwanted grid magically disappear. The same technique could be used to blur a background while keeping a subject with extended depth entirely sharp.

Today marks the official start of the spring, while the weekend saw the re-opening of Yosemite National Park. The park had been closed since February 25, the second longest closure in memory – floods in 1997 closed the park for over two months. The closure of this winter was caused by unusually deep snow. On February 28, 40 inches of snow had accumulated in Yosemite Valley, a record for the date. Higher elevations had received more than 180 inches.

While those higher elevations are covered by snow each winter, snow is not a given in Yosemite Valley. Located at an elevation of around 4,000 feet, the valley hardly receives any snow some years. Typically, most winter storms blanket the mountains surrounding the valley with snow but leave the valley itself looking bleak and muddy. Seeing the valley floor covered with snow is a relatively rare treat, and even rarer is the sight of everything covered with snow. Perhaps right after a winter storm is when Yosemite Valley is most picturesque. Snow clings to every branch and rock, as mist fills up the air. Those were the conditions when two of the most well-known photographs of Yosemite were made: Ansel Adams Clearing Winter Storm (1944) in black and white, and Galen Rowell Clearing Storm over El Capitan (1973) in color.

Since my first visit in February 1993, I had been regularly returning to Yosemite Valley, not only for rock climbing but also to photograph. However, for several years, despite dozens of visits, I remained disappointed with the results of my efforts and felt I didn’t manage to capture any of the valley’s magic. Inspired by the two photographs above-mentioned, I decided to try a new approach. At that time, I was working as a computer scientist, so my excursions to Yosemite had always been at pre-planned times, on weekends except for the occasional longer big-wall climb. In the winter of 1998, I figured out that I could not just show up and hope something interesting may happen, but that instead, I should watch the weather conditions in order to come when something was happening. Naturally, that “something” was a clearing winter storm.

For my first post-storm visit, I left my home in Menlo Park, CA shortly before sunrise. The most direct route to Yosemite is via Oakdale and CA-120, but the highway climbs over to 6,000 feet elevation near Crane Flat before descending to Yosemite Valley. With fresh snow in the offing, I drove instead CA-140 via Mariposa, following the lower-elevation Merced Canyon and entering the park at El Portal (1,940 feet), near its lowest point. Delighted to see the first light highlighting a wonderland of fresh snow at Midpines, the high point of CA-140, I stopped to take a few pictures. When I arrived in Yosemite Valley in the late morning, I immediately regretted that pause. As the sun had already been up for a couple of hours, the snow was melting and falling from the trees. Most of them were bare of snow. High up the cliff, mist was still swirling along the rock walls, and a dusting of snow could still be seen. I quickly pulled out my large-format camera and used the longest lens I had, a 450mm lens (roughly equivalent to 90mm on full-frame) to frame a tight composition. The photograph is memorable to me because it was the first I made of a clearing winter storm in Yosemite. Without obvious landmarks, it evokes the power of the place. Yet, I immediately realized I had to adjust my timing for the next time.

Winter is the season when Yosemite receives the most precipitation. I was given a second chance that same winter when another storm with a snow level below 4,000 feet was forecasted to clear during the night. Because I was working in a research institute, it wasn’t a problem to be out of the office on a weekday. Leaving home in the middle of the night, I arrived at El Capitan Meadow, my favorite spot in Yosemite Valley, before the sun reached it, and immediately began to plan my photographs. For my first composition, I used a normal lens and included two focal points: the frozen oak tree detached against the sky on the right, and the snowy top of the Leaning Tower peeking between the masses of Lower and Middle Cathedral Rocks that attracts the eye with its brightness and contrast despite its tiny size – in a large print frozen trees are visible on the peak. In the summer, the shaded rock walls would look lifeless, but the fresh snow clinging to their steep faces created a beautiful tint by reflecting the blue sky. After setting up the large-format camera while El Capitan Meadow was still in the shade, I waited for the sun and made the exposure less than a minute after the entire meadow was lit.

Afterward, in a state of flow, I promptly switched to a longer lens for a study in textures, isolating a cottonwood tree caressed by the early morning light at the base of Middle Cathedral Rocks whose north face was strikingly blanketed by snow. The pine trees added a subtle hint of green, noticeable because of the homogeneity of the skyless composition dominated by the blue of open shade. Walking a few hundred yards to the bridge, I used the widest lens I had for that camera (a 90mm lens, equivalent to 18mm on full-frame) to include the entire scene with the two iconic rock formations, the Merced River, and El Capitan Meadows, taking advantage of wispy clouds.

This wintry moment turned out to be as fleeting as I expected it to be. Within an hour of the sun’s appearance, the conifer trees were already more dark-green than white. With snow on the ground, but not on the trees, the ground of a meadow appears distractingly bright compared to the rest of the scene. I drove a few minutes to the Valley View where I could use a foreground of rocks and water instead of a snowy meadow. Although the snow had been melting fast, not everything was lost as some mist was still hanging out high along rock walls while clouds remained wispy enough to echo the snow on the distant meadow and peaks. Unlike others, the image is of course a well-worn composition, but it was still the most satisfying I had made at that location.

I left the valley in the late morning, returning to work in the mid-afternoon with a broad smile. For the first time in five years, I was pleased with the way a Yosemite photography session had turned out. It could just be that with my penchant for climbing snow-covered peaks, a mountain scene without snow was missing an element that resonated with me. But I think it was a pivotal moment because, besides the experience and beauty I was privileged to witness, I felt that I had made something happen. The morning was productive. The two first images on this page turned quickly among the first set of prints (made in Cibachrome) that I ever sold.