It got up bright and early and looked outside. It snowed overnight. I was thrilled. Following some excellent advice from a photographer who has spent a lot of time at Bryce Canyon, I went to Sunset Point, not Sunrise Point. This is one of my favorite photos for this date and one of my all time favorite photos.
“The Sentinel”, the thin, tall hoodoo just left of center in this photo, fell the evening/night of November 25/26, 2016. It broke at its narrow waist, succumbing to centuries of wind, rain, ice, and erosion.
Bryce Canyon at Sunrise, Utah. April 25, 2011.
This is another view from Sunset Point. This is another of my all time favorite photos.
I left Bryce Canyon and headed for Zion National Park. I spent the afternoon in the Checkerboard Mesa area.
I was intrigued by the petrified sand dunes across the road from the famous mesa. I put the camera very close to the ground and used a wide angle lens to catch the sweep of the dunes. This is one of my favorite images.
Then it occurred to me to combine Checkerboard Mesa and the petrified dunes in one sweeping panoramic image. I moved to a different location to better capture the mesa and the dunes. I took 8 vertical images with a 17mm wide angle lens and stitched them together to create a panorama that is over 360° wide. If you look carefully, you will see the far left side of the image and the far right side are the same. This is my other most favorite image for April 25.
Before leaving Zion National Park to head for California, I took one last image. My 48 hour adventure in six spectacular parks of southern Utah was over.
Links
Series: Favorite Photos by Date – all about this series
The National Park Series: Where to Go and When
Park Web Sites
Lodging
River Canyon Lodge – my place to stay in Moab
Ruby’s Inn – the place to stay when visiting Bryce Canyon