2018 Monthly Favorites

2018, Luna's Last Year

Yes, here I am again.  I’m feeling nostalgic and grateful for another full year, punctuated with images.  Perhaps it’s my imagination but editing for this project only gets more difficult with time.  The alert reader may notice that I’ve cheated a bit on my “one per month” rule.  It’s good to be queen.

As many of you know, I lost Luna, my canine traveling companion, this month.  I dedicate this missive to her, pictured above.

I hope you’ll enjoy this, the seventh annual installment of the retrospective.

January

Death Valley.  I go there a lot, alone or with family.  This time I decided to mix it up a bit and go with a workshop.  I wanted to see this place through another set of eyes, so I signed on with Guy Tal and Michael Gordon.  These guys are great, as I’ve mentioned before.  A bonus was traveling with a dear friend and making some new ones.  I love this image because it’s almost abstract and takes advantage of the warm and cool pastels of the sunrise over Mesquite Dunes.  It represents a stretch in my way of seeing, which is one of the things I was after on this trip.

February

After 29 years in Arizona, I’ve just discovered Organ Pipe National Monument.  It’s close enough for a short camping trip and full of interesting stuff.  This sunrise behind the eponymous cactus was a short walk from the big campground.  I have a soft spot for this camping trip because it included Lurch’s 200^th night out.

March

I used to belong to a photo club in which the leader made assignments each month.  His favorite was surrealism.   I tend to be more of a realistic landscape photographer, so these (oddly repetitive) assignments were a challenge.  This one I stumbled on, but I believe it qualifies.  What a delightful week on Lake Powell with Marco and friends, including the undisputed photographic expert on the lake, Gary Ladd.  This camp in the Escalante Arm of the lake didn’t look like much when we pulled up, but the extravagant sky and still water in the morning blew me way.  You never know.

April

I’ve perhaps said enough about this trip to the North Rim.  Sadly, it might have been my last chance to be there before the park opens for the season May 15.  One of the fun things about that for me is that views like this open up before the trees leaf out.  This spot in the lodge, known as the Moon Room, is my favorite quiet place to read and commune, especially in the hot days of summer.

May

May was a busy month; wild horses, Moab, Arizona and Utah slot canyons and the Oregon Coast. This moment in Kanarra Canyon continues to move me.  There were five of us, and for some reason I was alone in this spot during the hike out.  The molten light was captivating.  After I shot it, I scooted back up the canyon to try and interest my companions, but they were engrossed in their own projects.  I tried.

June

I’ve been to Marble Viewpoint a lot.  It’s a pretty cool spot, but I’d thought I was done creating fresh images there.  This one surprised me, taken in the gale-force wind that is so common there just as the sun crested the horizon to the right of Navajo Mountain, which eighty miles away.  I do love those bright orange lichens, too

July

Point Sublime.  Monsoon season. Sunset through a curtain of rain.  Yep.

August

The more time I spend in Yarnell, the more shooting I’ve been doing in nearby Prescott.  Watson Lake is uncommonly beautiful, whether I shoot from my kayak or from the shore.  Mostly I was there to catch the rising full moon.  As often happens, though, the real show was not what I expected.  These reflections and the kayaker took my breath away.  Here’s a little geeky aside; from the vantage point of the trail, the top of the island overlapped the far shore.  Photographers call that a “merger,” and though they’re not all bad, this one was.  I’m sure I looked pretty comical, frictioning up the granitic slabs until I was high enough to eliminate the merger.  I’m glad I did.

September

Blue Ridge Reservoir on the Mogollon Rim is not so popular in September.  It was a little chilly rigging the boat predawn and I paddled out wearing long underwear, among other charming attire.  The experience was already magical, all alone out there, and then I turned around and saw the sunlight on the fog and the aspens clinging to the rocks. Mystic light.

October

Like May, October was a delightfully busy month.  Unlike May, I just can’t choose between images of the three excursions.  Like last year, I’m breaking my own rule.

It seems I can’t stay away from the North Kaibab Forest when the aspens are turning.  I’ve done this trip for years, and I don’t see that changing any time soon.  This was the first time that there was weather.  Though I love the look of leaves brilliantly back-lighted by the sun, these low clouds and fog let me work with an entirely different feel and spectacular warm-cool color combinations.  Never mind I spent 4 days in my rain gear, constantly damp.  The shooting and the solitude were irreplaceable.

Chaco.  This shot has been done by others, of course, but the particular quality of light alternating room-to-room this morning was poignant. Again, I broke off from the group and was communing, this time with the ancients.

Scott Baxter set this one up as part of his workshop, so I can’t take full credit.  Still I love it.  If you ever get to X-Diamond Ranch in the White Mountains ask Wink, the owner, about the ten-dollar horse (the white one).

November

Choosing this month’s image was not so hard.  This may be my favorite for the year.  I planned this composition of the setting moon over Watson Lake painstakingly with photo and weather apps and walked a couple of miles in the dark in temperatures cold enough to freeze breath midair as it escaped. I didn’t anticipate the lovely yellow cottonwoods, nor could I see them when I started shooting.  They really make the shot and were just dumb luck. 

December

It’s challenging to decide on a favorite from a month that has just passed.  As time goes by I become objective and so more able to filter out the emotional attachment I have to the experience, rather than the image itself.  That being said, this one is my current favs. I love the peaceful subtlety of this image of Death Valley dunes from made during this year’s winter solstice trip.

As Casey Kasem would have said, "So there you have it. Keep your feet on the ground and keep reaching for the stars."

See you next year.