After our Santa Fe Photo Workshop back in September of 2002, we had decided that we would definitely do another at some point. In January we contacted our trusty instructor Dale from TravelNerds who suggested that April was a great time to see Canyonlands and Arches National Parks in Utah. We sent email out to a bunch of friends and Matt and Louis decided to join us. We booked flights, hotels and a car, then we just had to wait a few months for April to roll around!
Thursday, April 24
The alarm went off at 4am, yikes! We all got ready and piled into the car at 5am, heading for the San Jose airport. We took a flight to Salt Lake City, and then another shorter one to Grand Junction, Colorado. Avis upgraded us to a Suburban, which turned out to be a very spacious vehicle for our long weekend. We grabbed some food at a local supermarket, then drove a few miles down the road to a view area just over the border into Utah, where we ate lunch.
We continued towards Moab, driving a more scenic route that was recommended to us. We saw some very impressive scenery, but we knew it was just the beginning of what we'd see over the weekend. It took us about two hours to make it all the way to Moab, where we checked in at the Castle Rock Inn. Dale gave us a call and told us to be ready at 5am the next morning so we could catch a great sunrise.
Friday, April 25
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In the morning we all piled into the trusty TravelNerds van, stopped for some breakfast burritos, then headed about an hour North to Canyonlands National Park. Our first stop was Mesa Arch. We hiked a short distance to the arch and started taking pictures in the pre-dawn light, waiting for sunrise. There were a few people there already, one was a stock photographer taking pictures of a woman sitting on the arch. It's true they were there first, but it would have been nice for them not to completely hog the arch at sunrise. We all found lots of other views to photograph, the sun coming over the mountains and through the arch was spectacular.
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We made a couple of stops throughout the morning, then we went to Upheaval Dome, where Dale made some oatmeal and we all had breakfast. Dale had done a great job of stocking the van. We had lots of water, an assortment of juices, some cookies and granola bars. We looked at some of our pictures from the morning, then hiked a bit to look out over some sweeping views. The weather was fantastic, not a cloud in the sky. (We actually could have used a few clouds for photographic effect!)
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We headed back to Moab to have lunch and review our first set of pictures, stopping along the way to look at some petroglyphs. Lots of great stuff. After lunch Matt was feeling pretty tired so he decided to stay at the hotel and get some rest while the rest of us headed to the Southern part of Canyonlands, the Needles. We stopped to look at some petroglyphs at Newspaper Rock, then we stopped at Squaw Hill. We hiked around a large rock outcropping, taking pictures all around. As we crested over a ridge at one point we encountered what must have been 50 mile an hour winds due to the way the rock narrowed on either side. It felt like we could fly away if we had a bit of a sail. Back in Moab Dale dropped us off at the hotel, with a 6am departure for Saturday morning. The four of us were going to have dinner at "Eric's" next door to the hotel, but one look at the menu (and the salad bar) and we turned right back around and left! We walked across the street to the Moab Brewery where we were able to get a table quickly, and they were even able to make some Cosmos (once I told them what the ingredients were). Definitely a much better dinner.
Saturday, April 25
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6am sharp we all piled into the van, made a quick stop at the local supermarket for food, then headed into Arches National Park. We made a quick stop at "Park Avenue", then headed to an overlook area for Delicate Arch. The arch looked tiny in the distance. Later on, we'd see it up close. We drove over to the Devil's Garden, then began an 8 mile hike to Double O Arch. Along the way we walked through an incredible array of rock structures and over a narrow 'fin' with a drop of several hundred to one side. When we reached the end of the trail we climbed through a hole in the rock, and then up an embankment. We were treated to a view of the valley through a giant hole in the rock. Awesome!
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These are both of the same arch, from the front and (from a long distance away) the back. Check out how small Rick looks, and then how small the arch looks!
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After hiking back to the van, Dale dropped Rick, Randy and Louis at one end of Park Avenue, then drove to the other end to wait for us. It took us about 45 minutes to walk through, stopping to take lots of pictures along the way. The scenery almost looked like something out of a Disneyland ride, it was all so picture perfect. Since we were headed to Delicate Arch at sunset, we decided to rest for a bit during the afternoon. We all did our own thing for lunch, then met in our room to look at some pictures. We had made reservations at the Sunset Grill, a great restaurant on a hill overlooking Moab. After dinner we drove back into Arches, parked and then hiked a few miles up to the arch. We just made it before the sun went down, getting some great shots of the arch in the setting sun. It got dark quite quickly as we headed back to the van. We stopped for a bit on the way out of the park to look at the stars. It was so dark and the sky was filled with them.
As we made out way back to the hotel in Moab, we encountered the tail end of the classic car show that had been going on over the weekend. It was 10pm but the streets were lined with people sitting in folding chairs watching a stream of cars cruising the main street. We crept along with the rest of the cars, at a few points hearing someone yell out "Yeah, go TravelNerds!". Dale's signage on the outside of the van was clearly doing it's job!
Sunday, April 26
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Another 6am departure, with breakfast at the same supermarket. We headed back into Arches, this time parking near Double Arch. We walked around for a couple of hours, marveling at the rock formations. We even had a visit from Yvonka! The scale of some of the rocks was so big, it was challenging getting it across in our pictures. Dale helped with suggestions on framing objects in the foreground to capture the scale of things. Afterwards we headed back to the hotel to look over the morning's pictures. Randy transferred some files from Dale's machine; thanks Dale for all the pictures of the group!
We said goodbye to Dale, thanking him for a great weekend. Once again Dale was a great guide, never tiring, always knowing right where to be for the best shot. He gets four thumbs up from our group!
On the way back to Grand Junction we drove up into Castle Valley for yet more sweeping views. The rest of the drive back to the airport went by quickly, with most of the group taking a nap in our extra large vehicle. At the airport we spent some time copying pictures between machines and looking through the great shots we had taken. Two flights later we were back in the Bay Area. All together we had taken over 3200 pictures, more than 4.2GB worth!
The Gear
For this trip we used a Nikon Coolpix 5000 and a Nikon Coolpix 5700. We both came to enjoy using the 5700 more than the 5000 due to it's larger zoom range (8X) and it's electronic viewfinder. Being able to see exactly the picture you're about to take as you press the shutter is invaluable. I doubt we'll buy another high end camera without an electronic viewfinder again. For laptops we had a 17" PowerBook and a 12" PowerBook. We used iPhoto for transfering our pictures and reviewing them. The website was put together with Photoshop 7 and Go Live 6. The panorama was created with a Kaidan panoramic head and Realviz Stitcher.