Backpacking Misadventures
It’s great to write to you all again, I hope you’re all doing well. Work has been very busy so I haven’t had as much time to photograph and write.
I am happy to confirm that I will be putting out my annual portfolio calendar for preorder sometime in the next few weeks. If you’re interested and want to be notified once it’s released, please sign up for my email list at the bottom of this page.
I started 2023 with grand ideas for the types of backpacking trips I wanted to do in the upcoming year. As I entered my third year of backpacking, I envisioned embarking on long, multi-day hikes deep into the Sierra backcountry. At the time, I predicted an average or below-average winter’s worth of snowfall, as had been the norm for the past few years. With that in mind, I booked multiple backpacking permits six months ahead of time, all spaced out throughout June and July. This way, I would have several trails from which to choose when summer came. Nature had other plans.
The Southern Sierra reached a peak snowpack measuring 300 percent of normal. While the extra snow brought welcome relief from California’s drought, it complicated my backpacking plans. I canceled permit after permit as May and June rolled past and trails remained blocked by snow. As more trail reports rolled in, further news of treacherous stream crossings and high snowpack forced me to cancel the rest of the permits I booked six months prior.
Finally, in late July, after several hectic weeks of work, I felt more than ready to set out on a backpacking trip—any backpacking trip. I found permits for a hike east of Yosemite National Park on the next available weekend.
I started Saturday morning with a warm-up hike in Little Lakes Valley. Despite visiting this area many times last summer, I always enjoy returning to see how conditions have changed.
The backpacking trip into Twenty Lakes Basin started off deceptively easy. There was little snow on the first, relatively flat section of the trail. However, the snow started to accumulate several miles into the wilderness at Lundy Pass. Despite that, I continued, feeling confident that I was making quick progress. As I traversed a steep snowfield above one of the lakes, I lost my footing and slipped. I managed to self-arrest with one of my trekking poles and pulled myself to safety, but at that point I realized I had underestimated the trail.
I finally donned micro spikes, which gave me a bit more traction as I crossed a few more snowy slopes, but I grew increasingly weary. Every snowfield I crossed now would mean another one I had to navigate on the return journey the next day.
I started descending a snowfield which appeared to drop off directly over one of the lakes. The warm day had turned the snow into a slippery, slushy mess. Even as I tread cautiously with spikes, my descent felt increasingly unsafe. As I tried to peer over the lakeshore to find a way to safely descend, I spotted two hikers coming my way. When they arrived, I asked them about the trail conditions up ahead. Both of them, Bin and Ethan, told me they encountered more snow ahead, and they had turned around after encountering a sketchy stream crossing.
The prospect of more snow and a stream crossing convinced me that it was time to turn back. My night in the backcountry would have to wait. It felt a bit disappointing to turn back after hiking for a good chunk of the afternoon, but I knew I made the right decision. I followed Bin and Ethan and we chatted the rest of the way back to the trailhead.
Once I returned to my car, I turned my attention to finding a location for sunset. Since I did not plan on photographing sunset that day, I looked around on the map for an area I had not yet visited before.
I drove an hour south towards Benton Crossing, where the Owens River meanders across Long Valley. As I drove across the plateau, I spotted cattle roaming across the wide-open plains. I had arrived in the area right as golden hour began, and everything took on a warm, golden glow.
A gentle breeze blew as sunset came and went. As the sky dimmed into twilight, I noticed the moon had risen over the horizon behind a thin layer of clouds. I walked along the Owens River in search of some kind of foreground element and found a patch of tall rabbitbrush. The resulting shot captured the calm I felt that evening. After a frustrating day of hiking, it felt satisfying to end on a high note.
On my drive back home the next day, I noticed lenticular clouds forming over the Sierra during the afternoon. Excited by the prospect of photographing these otherworldly clouds, I stayed around in Yosemite waiting for them to accumulate overhead.
In the meantime, I drove along Tioga Road looking for wildflowers. After last year’s below average winter, I found scarcely any in the Yosemite high country. I hoped that this year’s abundant snowmelt would change that. After visiting several meadows, I finally found a nice patch of alpine shooting stars in Tuolumne Meadows. I decided to photograph sunset here.
As I waited for dusk, mosquitos started hovering around me. The abundant water meant that the bugs were out in full force. As is often the case in the Sierra Nevada, photographing the sunset turned into a running battle between adjusting my camera and swatting away mosquitos. The bug bites were well worth it though. The entire meadow and the peaks behind it turned bright orange as the sun set behind me.
I had initially framed the scene above with a 35mm lens, keeping the composition relatively tight. However, I changed my mind once I noticed that the clouds above me started glowing as well. As the skies turned glowing pink, I switched over to a 24mm wide-angle lens, which also allowed me to include the water reflection underneath the wildflowers.
For me, the wide-angle view feels like the most complete rendition of the scene. It captures every element that drew me to this spot: the wildflowers, the clouds, and the pool of reflective water in the foreground.
Despite a photographically successful trip last time, my ultimate goal remained to camp overnight in the backcountry. I planned another trip in August, hoping that it would be late enough to avoid the lingering snow and high stream crossings that complicate any hike deep into the mountains.
The week before I was scheduled to leave, I read news of a strengthening tropical storm off the coast of Mexico. As the weekend drew near, it became increasingly clear that the storm, now Hurricane Hilary, would strike Southern California. This would be the area’s first tropical storm since 1997. Right on the exact weekend of my trip. Great…
While I still decided to head out to the Sierra, I opted to cancel my permits in light of the forecasts for torrential rain. If I could stick around until after the storm had passed, perhaps I could find some great light.
After a late afternoon drive across the Sierra, I woke at 4:15 AM the next morning for yet another hike in Little Lakes Valley. This time, I had heard about wildflowers around a lake that was a bit further into the valley. I hiked out to the location, set up a shot next to a row of wildflowers right next to the water, and pulled a Nikon flash unit out of my pack.
A few months ago, I had purchased a flash unit to use in my landscape photography. I had generally avoided using fill-flash up until this point as I felt intimidated by all the complexities of attempting to meter for a correct exposure. However, I felt like this scene, with its dimly lit wildflowers in the foreground and bright mountains in the background, would necessitate the flash. To be safe, I also used my tried and tested graduated neutral density filters to even out the exposure.
I burned through well over half a roll, trying to bracket my exposures and test out a variety of flash settings. In the end, I only managed to produce one evenly exposed image that wasn’t woefully over or underexposed. This fill-flash thing is going to require more practice.
That morning began with clear skies, scarcely hinting at the storm to come. Yet it did eventually arrive. The weather took a decided turn for the worse in the afternoon. Ominous storm clouds began to gather overhead and eventually the rain began coming down with increasing intensity.
I drove up to the Yosemite high country to look any possible breaks in the weather and potential wildflowers. The rain continued in fits and starts, but I managed to stumble across some alpine goldenrods in one of the meadows. During one break in the weather, I set up my tripod and camera as I saw another patch of rain approach me from the west. Thankfully, I managed to snap a few shots and run back to my car before the sky opened once again.
After staying in the Yosemite high country for most of the day, I decided to try my luck at photographing sunset. Despite the clouds, I saw one clear patch of sky off to the west. Sure enough, the light intensified right before sunset, catching me unaware as I drove. Forced to think quickly, I parked on the side of the road and ran towards the sunset spot in Tuolumne Meadows I had found on the last trip.
I usually photograph scenes directly away from the sun, relying on reflected light to illuminate distant peaks. This time, the storm light forced me to photograph towards the sun instead. Despite the storminess, the sunset turned into one of the most vivid I had witnessed in recent memory. The sky glowed bright red and pink. Lightning flashed in the dark clouds above the sun.
From a technical standpoint, I wish I had more time to find a somewhat different composition. I would usually prefer a more layered scene. However, the fast-changing light forced me to move quickly, and I opted for a spot I had visited before. Overall, I’m satisfied with how the sunset looks, even if I would have preferred a slightly different scene.
The forecast for the next day did not bode well. It would rain the entire day. The poor weather forced me to do something I almost never do on these trips: I slept in. The rest of the day followed a similar theme: I spent most of it relaxing indoors or driving around the town of Bishop looking for new photo ideas.
The weather began to clear the next morning. I drove up into Bishop Creek Canyon, west of town, to look for wildflowers alongside the road. I found a blooming fireweed flower perched right next to an aspen tree and immediately felt drawn to the scene. However, the position of the tree made for an awkward angle. With all the foliage surrounding the tree, I struggled to position my camera and tripod for a clear view.
Several cars crept past as I fiddled with my lens and moved my tripod back and forth a few inches at a time. In my head, I imagined the drivers wondering about this random man hunched over a tripod peering intently at some leaves. With Kodak Ektachrome and a warming filter, my film had an effective ISO of 64. I also closed down the aperture to maximize depth of field. All this meant that I would need a relatively long exposure, so I waited for the wind to calm so that the leaves would stop moving in the breeze. The wind never completely died down, but I managed to fire off a few exposures in the few lulls that came.
Looking at this photo, one would be hard-pressed to find out it was taken less than ten feet away from the road. Having seen all the cars drive past, it felt like I had found a special scene all to myself.
Once the skies cleared, I excitedly planned for sunset that evening in Yosemite National Park, on my drive home. I decided to drive across the park and hike to Sentinel Dome to see sunset over Yosemite Valley.
Along the way, I decided to take my time and stopped at an unnamed lake beside Tioga Road that I had driven past many times. I had always noticed the abundant boulders scattered around the pond, but usually drove straight past on my way to other scenes. Now with time to spare, I finally stopped to see what I could photograph.
I began setting up my tripod for a close-up shot of the boulders when a deer started walking across the water and into my field of view. I excitedly turned the camera towards the deer and snapped a photo of it walking across the lake.
I clicked the shutter again, but nothing happened. I checked the display and saw that I had just finished the roll of film. I scrambled to retrieve another roll from my backpack and load it into the camera, but the deer had ventured off, away from the reach of my telephoto lens.
After two hours of driving, I arrived above Yosemite Valley only to find it covered in clouds. I could wait for sunset and hope that the clouds dissipated. Or I could drive back across the park in search of clearer skies. I opted for the latter. Initially I thought I had made the wrong decision. The drive took me through patches of intense rain, with the sun nowhere to be seen. However, the skies finally began to clear when I arrived at Tuolumne Meadows. I continued driving east hoping that the weather would stay clear by the time I arrived at some of the other meadows further east.
There was just fifteen minutes of sunlight left. However, because I had scouted out this area extensively on my last trip, I came up with a plan to photograph two specific meadows along the road with the last light of the day. I arrived at the first one at the peak of golden hour. The last traces of the tropical storm had not completely cleared, so there were still lingering clouds hovering above the peaks. I alternated between marveling at the light and snapping away on my camera.
Once I felt I had done justice to the two main scenes, I drove off towards the second meadow and arrived with minutes to spare. The light had cooled into dark blue and pink hues, meaning I had mere seconds left before it was gone for good. I had just enough time run to a clearing and to set up for one photo before the light faded completely.
My first backpacking trip of the season would have to wait just a little bit longer. In some ways, I was unlucky. Environmental and weather conditions forced me to change or cancel my plans on two separate occasions.
Yet my “bad luck” also allowed me to capitalize on moments of good luck. I had the chance to return to familiar locations, namely Little Lakes Valley and the Yosemite high country, both of which I had visited many times last year. I was able to see how both places had changed dramatically because of the past winter. That familiarity also allowed me to better take advantage of weather conditions and find opportunities to witness some truly special moments of magical light.