Yellowstone is always good for tasty timelapse, and this one from Christopher Cauble renders the wonders of the oldest National Park in new ways. Then again, maybe it's the music. See, and hear, for yourself.
* * * The Sunday Morning Chillax? Here's the idea. It's Sunday. You're up early. You're enjoying a cup of coffee in the quiet morning while your kids sleep in. No need to read, this is always a video; something to give you happy thoughts about mountains, fresh air, stoke, fun, or being outside. Enjoy. Relax. Not guaranteed to be weekly . . . hey, you get what you pay for.
Last I heard, Jackson, Wyoming is enjoying a lovely 10-degree low and taking on an inch or two of fluff during some awfully pleasant snow flurries. They say the skiing's not that great this year, either. So prepare yourself. Corners of the American Sonoran Desert are invoking cliché lyrics to Jimmy Buffet songs at 74 degrees during the day and chilling the bones at night around 45. Those are facts, so pack the bikes and come on down. 38 Photos . . .
What makes this short piece unique is its perspective: most of this is shot from a radio controlled helicopter, giving us not just an aerial view, but also a view on the move.
Enjoy.
* * * The Sunday Morning Chillax? Here's the idea. It's Sunday. Maybe you're up early and enjoying a cup of coffee in the quiet morning while your kids sleep in. No need to read, this is always a video; something to give you happy thoughts about mountains, fresh air, stoke, fun, or being outside. Enjoy. Relax. Not guaranteed to be weekly . . . hey, you get what you pay for.
Last school year, we hosted and became family with a 16-year old girl from Ukraine who wanted nothing more than to see Grand Canyon. I've written about her a few times already, but because this website increasingly gets more readers every day (and we're grateful for it), I feel like I need to preface this properly. Her name is Ania and she lived with us for almost a year (more). Today, Ania attends a university in Lithuania studying English and business. During her spring semester here, she took a guitar class and a photography class. Truthfully, she taught me a lot about photography. And I taught tried to teach her how to rock a C7 chord, but she resisted trimming her fingernails.
Photography class started with the history of image making, so it was weeks before she came home with a pinhole camera and a project to shoot. When the class moved on to 35mm cameras . . .
The best part of autumn, at least the best part in Arizona, is fickle and wandering. That would be the temperature. The mornings frequently greet you . . .
My 4 year old daughter usurped my longest piece of climbing gear. It's a 30-foot piece of bright yellow tubular webbing that I used quite frequently for building anchors until I dedicated it to slacklining. But I have to admit rock climbing is one of the pursuits that I've accidentally abandoned, so I should be happy to see my little girl playing with my near-forgotten gear, tying it to the back of a hat, putting it on her head, and hearing her declare, "I'm Rapunzel, Papa! Pretend you're stuck. I'll save you!" Brooke and I used to spend more than one weekend a month climbing - er, more like hang dogging - somewhere. Climbing is a drug and you're easily addicted. Even though I haven't been in a long time, I will always enjoy the photography and stories . . .
It's not too frequent that I take a fellas-only trip, and that's either a bummer or something my doctor would applaud. For instance, three days of living on hotdogs, cheeze puffs, and mediocre-at-best canned light beer (vented wide mouth!) doesn't do a body good. I'm not letting out any deep secrets about trips with the boys. That's the menu - likely all across the land, give or take an ingredient. Everyone knows it's an unusual dude who cooks in favor of nutritional value, balance, and class when there are no lovely blondes, brunettes, or red heads nearby to impress.
Boil down the miracle of rainbows to their physical properties and you learn they're just a trick of refracting light. Yet they're still amazing to spot and behold. Tell me, who's backseat full-o-kids hasn't lit up with racket at the sight of a rainbow after a storm?
Since rainbows are nothing more than just bending light, you just need the right circumstances and you can see a rainbow almost anywhere. It doesn't always have to be after a storm. Example? Squirt your garden hose into the air at different angles and you'll get a rainbow eventually.
Now turn your attention to the waterfalls of Yosemite Valley. At night, during certain full moon cycles of late spring and early summer, the sunlight reflecting off of the surface of the moon is not only enough, but also . . .
As of today, the Wallow Wildfire in eastern Arizona has burned over 200,000300,000400,000 500,000 acres and it's still going. The big cloud you see in this video is the smoke rising from the forest near Alpine, Arizona. It's amazing in the holy-shit-that-makes-my-stomach-drop sense. Right now, officials believe that the fire started from an abandoned campfire.
Of all the ways to experience Grand Canyon, from browsing with the tourist herds on the South Rim for a day to riding the Colorado River for 10 days, nothing could be as chilling as flying below the rim. Enjoy this ride . . .
Put your hands together for Brad Garland. His photo taken from Alstrom Point on Lake Powell brought in the most votes this week (click here to see the other entires). Brad worked hard for this photo. He ferried his son and two buds to a trailhead at Paria Canyon, then spent four days doing a solo exploration of the area until the threesome would finish their backpacking trip. A winter storm settled in with brutal winds of 60 mph, freezing temperatures, and a touch of snow. He hunkered down in the comfort of his King Kamper trailer, probably gave a thought to his son and his friends with something like, "poor fellas are gonna be miserable tonight, sucks to be them!", and woke up the next day to get this shot and many others.
I received a few emails this week about these photos, not just Brad's. Of all of them, this one really sends the message as to why Brad's photo won:
"I admit that I'm biased towards photo #1, though. Growing up, our family spent a lot of time camping at Lake Powell . . . I remember one particular trip where a rental boat pulled up about a 100 yards from our camp and the operators wrestled out several cameras, cases, and tripods to take photos of the butte. At the time, that was just the scenery we camped in, but now, looking back, it's like, 'Holy crap! That's the scenery we camped in!'" - Craig
Somehow, he managed to strike a chord with most hearts out there. Brad gets a $50 gift card to REI.
Today in outdoor history John Muir was born in 1838 in Scotland. His family emigrated to the United States when he was 11 years old and he lived in Wisconsin up until the middle of the American Civil War. Few know that Muir was draft dodger. He fled to Canada in 1864 to avoid getting called up for involuntary military service. During his dodge, Muir earned his way in the world through rough labor in the logging industry at a Canadian sawmill. Even fewer will see the irony in that - considering what he did later in life to help establish Sequoia and Yosemite National Parks and to found, oh, that little environmental (tree-saving?) organization known as The Sierra Club.
An accident at a sawmill rendered Muir nearly blind. Upon his recovery he decided simply to follow his dream of exploring wilderness and studying botany. Just a few months later he set out on his famous 1,000-mile walk from Indiana to Florida by way of, as he later wrote in a memoir, "the wildest, leafiest, and least trodden way I could find."
Muir's travels and explorations kept him from any semblance of a "normal" life for years. He wrote, he built a cabin that allowed a creek to run through it, he wandered in the mountains alone for weeks at a time, and rarely contracted himself with gainful employment. This lifestyle sustained him; he loved it. He was 42 years old when he did marry, and I'll avoid using the term "settled down." Muir managed to devote himself both to his family and to his love of the outdoors, which is why I'm writing about him here - that beautiful balance we parents all want, I assume, to attain.
He's well-known for referring to mountains and wilderness as home. I think we'd like to raise children who feel the same way.
If there's one thing I want you to take away from this website, it's that you should not underestimate my appreciation for photography of the natural world. Because this week brings us John Muir's birthday (the 21st) and Earth Day (the 22nd) I figured this to be a good time to feature some superb photos taken right here on planet Earth.
I've selected three lensmen whom I admire for their skill with the camera and their dedication to seeking out extraordinary light and subjects, a pursuit that does not come easy or without sacrifice. To tie it together, planet Earth is a pretty cool place and these guys do a bang up job taking photos of it. Each one of them shares a photograph with you right here, and I want you to tell me which one you like the best. Just because I think that'll be kind of fun to hear what you have to say.
So it's up to you now, good reader. Which one of these pictures is your favorite?
On Friday April 22, I'll check the results for the photo that earned the most votes, and the responsible photographer will get a $50 award, and you can download the winning photo as a wallpaper.
I tried to come up with a better way to say it, a way that wouldn't set your hopes too high lest you not agree with me. But this is a fact: this video is so stunning that for most of it you don't realize it's a timelapse. This timelapse does two things for me. One, it urges me to go to Yosemite again because it's been a while. Two, it speaks to the amount of work and love, or love of the work, that goes into shooting timelapses like this. Each scene does its own part to tell the story of a day of natural surprises in Yosemite Valley. Henry Jun Wah Lee deserves a vast slack-jawed audience and a pat on the back for this one.
As Colton says of his work here, "Camping every night, smelling like the animals we are, we came back with a handful of photos and a timelapase video that I hope you all will enjoy. I tell you, though; the beauty you see through your own two eyes is still untouchable. That is why we travel and explore to these magical places.Let pictures and videos of these magical places be inspiration to go there."
There's a reason why I came up with 3 Adventure Facts about Utah last week. That's where we went for six days, just for fun. Here is a sample of photos for you.
I try my best to hold back on the proud, exuberant father stuff, but I won't right now. My daughter is merely 3 years old and she can spot this bird in a book or a picture and say, "Dat's a California condor!" As a matter of fact, a year ago we were visiting the North Rim of the Grand Canyon and went into the bookstore there. Inside there was a mural with a stuffed condor and she didn't even need me to ask. She just belted it out in that little room full of tourists, "Wook! A California condor!" At 2 years old. That kid is awesome.
