Hurricane Rim Trail…and Some Climbing

We made one last trip down to St. George this weekend before the summer heat takes over.  It was another weekend with one day of climbing and one day of biking.  This is definitely the best way to play in St. George.

For climbing, we went to the Turtle Wall.  This is a crag that I have definitely wanted to shoot photos of, but I think I need to make it more of a shoot.  I need to figure out what time would work the best,  what route gets the best light, and find someone who will climb it over and over.  It has a lot of potential, but I think it’s hard to bring that potential out.  But given that I was more interested in climbing than shooting, I think we still got some good photos.

Sunday morning we woke up and headed to Hurricane for an epic long ride.  There were debates about which direction we should ride the Hurricane rim loop, the way the map says or the way friends said.  Personally, I wish we had followed the map’s directions.  It would require a grueling uphill on a rocky dirt road, but the rest of the ride would be flat to downhill.  There would be a medium long technical uphill close to the end, but the rest of the trail would be great.  Either way, this is a great trail.  We only go lost once and had to skip a portion of the Gould’s Trail, but since we were all pretty tired at the very end, I think that worked out for the best.  Enjoy the Photos!

 

A Flower and an Apology

Once again, I’ve been neglecting my blog, and for that I apologize.  It’s been a really busy month, and that unusual time between winter and spring.  Some flowers are coming up, but nothing has captured my attention.  But I thought I’d share an image from last year that I never put up.  This was shot out in the wild close to sunset.  I was able to use the shadows in the background to really isolate this one flower.  Enjoy!

 

Action Photos from the Slopes

First of all, sorry about not posting much.  We’ve been really busy between the Alta Artists Market, this last weekends photo job, and taxes (booo) that I just haven’t had the time I need.

So this weekend was lots of fun.  I spent two days with a group of snowboarders and skiers from St. Louis at Park City and the Canyons outside of Salt Lake City.  The hired me as an action sports photographer to hang out with them and take tons of photos.  It turned out to be a lot of fun, especially since they were so phyched to do the jumps and rails.  We did so much shooting that my batteries (2!) nearly ran out both days.   So I thought I’d share a few photos from the shoot. Thanks again Dan and co. for the great time. Let me know when you’re back in town for either more snowboarding, or mt. biking.

 

Joshua Tree

I apologize for how long it’s been since I’ve posted a photo.  So I’ll keep the words short for this one.  We spent a weekend down in St. George two weekends ago, and I decided to climbing and bike myself rather than taking photos.  So I came away from the weekend with one photo.  Enjoy!

Alta Artists Market

This weekend is the Alta Artists Market at the Goldminers Daughter right at the base of the Alta Ski Resort.  I will have a table up there and will be selling matted prints, 5×7’s, 8×10’s and 11×14’s.  I am still putting all the prints together, so I’ll try to post the collection on here soon.  Although I hope that I sell out while I’m up there, I’m sure I’ll have prints left over if anyone is interested.  I’ll try to get a price list together as well.  If you’re in town, come on up to Alta and check it out. 

Little Wild Horse Canyon

The last few weeks has been pretty busy with other aspects of life and even photography.  I had a few print orders, as well as signing up to be part of the Alta Spring Arts Festival.  It will be a new experience for me that I’m excited about, but a little overwhelmed with the potential work.  Because of that, I haven’t had much time to shoot.  I want to stay active with the blog, so I dug through some photos from earlier this year.  This was an image that I really loved when converted to B&W, so I thought I’d share it with you.

Also, if you have suggestions of favorite images that I should print for the festival, please let me know.  I’ll probably make a formal post about it later this week, but start thinking!

 

St. Patty’s Day Pump

Last weekend was the St. Patty’s Day Pump climbing competition at The Front climbing club. This was the last comp of the season, so it was a big crowd. I think everyone had fun, the problems were great, and here are a few photos to show. For all the results, click here. For all the photos from the comp, you can check out my proofing page at Crux Photo.

This week’s Adventure - Back to Butler Fork

Although I’ve been pretty busy with non-photography matters, I did venture out in the back country for a dawn patrol Monday morning.  I meant to post these photos Tuesday… but life just got in the way.  So I like Butler Fork.  It’s an easy hike in, you can get lots of vertical, I just haven’t figured out where to shoot yet.  But I look forward to trying again. 

We skied a nice line through the aspen trees right at dawn.  We were gifted with inconsistent snow, and not enough speed.  So check this location off as not being a good spot.  I think there are a few other spots in the trees that are steeper, and we can look for a day were there was more fresh snow.   Our ride back to the car was great, but we had no time for shots.  It was much steeper, and deep in the pine trees.  If some morning light would make it through the trees, it could be perfect.

Finally, I’ll leave you with a black and white conversion of Twin Peaks and other surrounding mountains taken from the top of Butler Fork.

Butler Fork Skiing

On Saturday I got out with a few new friends to Butler Fork.  I had never skied this area, so I was excited to see new terrain.  We decided for a late start, especially since the weather forecast called for clouds most of the day.  Unfortunately, the sun came out and temperatures were up. We had some light soft snow on one north facing and tree covered area, but the south facing sides were pretty heavy and settled, especially near the bottom. Either way it was definitely a fun adventure, I learned about a new place to ski, and got some cool photos as the clouds finally did move in. 

Here are a few other shots of the skiing.  I’d like to get back to this area for a dawn patrol. I think it may get some really interesting light in the mornings, and it was a pretty quick hike from the car.

Sunrise at the Great Salt Lake

Last week I was really excited about going skiing before work. We had some great snow, and the sun was out. The only problem… I was sick. I decided that I had to do something, otherwise I would just go crazy. I headed out to the Great Salt Lake before work Friday morning after bailing on a friend to go skiing. I wasn’t quite sure where to go, but I left time to drive along the frontage road and pick a spot I thought would work. Aside from a bit of haze (our good old inversion), I think the images turned out well. I love the contrast between the blue water, and the early morning sun on Stansbury.

Just as I headed back to work, I saw this old trolley car near the Saltair Palace. I’m not sure the history of it, but I’d be interested in knowing if anyone else has that information. I thought It would be a perfect B&W. No fancy border this time!