It’s 4 AM on a Friday and I’m standing in Ansel Adams’ footsteps.
I don’t mean that I’m on my way to a legendary landscape photography career, I mean that I am literally standing where Ansel stood when he took one of the most iconic landscape shots ever, The Tetons and the Snake River, in 1942.
Ansel had the benefit of short trees revealing the graceful curve of the Snake River and left us all with the burden of trying to top his shot. I’ve been here a half-dozen times before and haven’t come close.
Instead of standing in Ansel’s footsteps I should be napping. I have an hour before my friends will meet me for sunrise, and I haven’t had more than four consecutive hours of sleep in three days and have been awake for over twenty-four hours straight. I’ve just driven fourteen hours from Seattle to Jackson, stopping only for gas in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho and Dillon, Montana. Including this trip to Jackson, I have driven over 2,500 miles in two weeks.
There are no clouds, so I already know sunrise is going to be a bust. Even though it’s an hour before dawn the sky is too bright to photograph the stars. I’m out here anyway, leaving the warm womb-like comfort of the car for the cold sagebrush-perfumed Wyoming air, ostensibly reserving the best spot for later, but really just happy that I have the view to myself for now. Hopefully there will be some nice pastels at dawn.
A few days earlier, in what now seems like an eternity, on a Sunday afternoon, I picked up fellow photographer and friend Koveh at the airport in Seattle for a week of shooting Mt. Rainier during peak wildflower season. The cold weather in July had different plans. There was more snow at Paradise (the most prolific spot for alpine wildflowers at Rainier) than had ever been recorded this late in the season. Paradise was off the table for lush wildflower meadows for this trip (and possibly the year), but macros, waterfalls, reflections, and star shots at night were still available.
We setup camp and short on time our only option for sunset was at Paradise. We found a small patch of snow-free glacier lilies (which really should have gone to seed a month earlier) facing the Tatoosh range, but the Tatoosh was cloaked in clouds through sunset. Despite being on Mt. Rainier we couldn’t see any part of it. Our only company was a lone marmot. The snow was keeping the humans away as much as the wildflowers.
We woke up for sunrise, but the clouds were thick as predicted by the forecast so we made the two-mile hike up to the always impressive Comet Falls. We passed patches of tiger and corn lilies which were at peak, again, a month later than normal. The falls were gorgeous as always, but there were patches of snow that by now would normally be melted. After bushwhacking our way to the creek down a steep crumbling slope to photograph the falls, we headed back on the trail to photograph the dew-covered corn lilies.
During the midst of our corn lily photographing ecstasy we were joined by another friend and photographer, Danny, who had been racing around Mt. Rainier trying to meet up with us. We decided to head back up to the falls once more (Danny for his first time ever) and take a few more photographs. Soon after, Koveh and I left Danny barefoot in the chilly creek while we went back down trail to find those tiger lilies, the most photogenic of all wildflowers on Mt. Rainier.
Back at the trailhead we hit a few more roadside waterfalls and noticed the sky was clearing (the forecast said this wasn’t supposed to happen today). We found food, an internet connection, and a forecast that had changed dramatically from the day before. Our best sunset opportunity of the trip, should the forecast be trusted (and based on historical precedent, it really shouldn’t be, ever) was going to be that night. Having more faith in the forecast than warranted, we made the two and a half hour drive ending with a long and bumpy dirt road to Mowich Lake, parking at the trailhead for the four mile round-trip hike to Eunice Lake.
After hiking through the forest and trudging through the snow on the lake basin and doing some more bush-whacking, we were on the steep slope facing the mountain, with the beautiful alpine lake in the foreground. There really should be a trail to this spot.
There was a slight problem: we couldn’t see the mountain.
Based on previous photographs we thought we had the best spot nailed down (we were each about twenty feet from each other), but it was impossible to tell. The steepness of the ridge made waiting very uncomfortable and moving more than a few feet a long and tedious task. We waited for over ninety minutes and witnessed a spectacular sunset, lighting the clouds in brilliant hues of red and pink.
There was still a slight problem: we still couldn’t see the mountain.
Finally, just after sunset, the clouds started to clear, and we were treated to some great pastel colors at dusk coupled with an elusive view of Rainier.
After having dinner at an all-night diner in Buckley, we drove ninety minutes to Grand Park for sunrise. Grand Park is a nine-mile round-trip hike to a surprisingly flat and vast wildflower meadow with an up close view of Rainier (having a similar angle on the mountain as at Sunrise). None of us had ever done this hike before, but recent trip reports indicated that the wildflowers could be promising. As far as we knew no one had photographed this spot at sunrise. We got to the trailhead in time to nap for ninety minutes (without sleeping bags, and because there were three of us, no way to recline in the car).
The alarm went off but I wasn’t sleeping anyway. We saw that it was 40 degrees outside, but thought we would warm up on the hike so we didn’t worry about it. Two hours later when we were in the large and flat wildflower meadow we realized the temperatures had dropped to below freezing. I was in shorts and a wet (from sweat) cotton t-shirt. I put on a fleece jacket and hoped that my fingers and toes wouldn’t freeze off.
The wildflowers, specifically lupine, were everywhere, but they were also frozen, and many of them had started the process of going to seed already (the cold temperatures weren’t helping). As the forecast predicted there was no cloud cover, but as we predicted, there was nice alpenglow. This is definitely a spot to try again next year.
After trudging back to the car, and driving two hours back to the campsite, we slept. Each of us had been up over 24 hours with just a sliver of restless sleep, hiking over 17 miles in the process.
For sunset we found a patch of roadside lupine in front of the Tatoosh at Paradise, but no clouds to go with them, and we napped at Reflection Lakes waiting for it to get dark enough to photograph the mountain and stars under moonlight.
After the star trails, Danny departed for work later that day, and Koveh and I drove ninety minutes to Sunrise for a cloudless sunrise. The wildflowers at Sunrise were at peak (but not nearly as lush in the direction of the mountain as those at Paradise usually are).
Bummed at the prospect of no clouds for the rest of the week, we had a quick nap at our campsite, and made the four and a half hour drive to Ruby Beach at Olympic National Park for sunset. There weren’t good clouds there either, and it was nearing low tide, meaning no wet sand for reflections and a shoreline that was behind some of the more impressive sea stacks. Fortunately I brought a long lens and was able to come away with some abstract shots of the sun reflecting in the sand. After sunset we stuck around to view the Milky Way, but the residual light from sunset and the rising moon made the photographs less impressive than the experience.
After sunset we drove through Port Angeles and up the windy road to Hurricane Ridge for sunrise, hoping to find a good patch of wildflowers in front of the Olympic Mountains in the dark. We failed. Much of the lupine had peaked, and that which hadn’t wasn’t in a good location. Obstruction Point Road was open but didn’t have any obvious patches viewable from the road. The deer, like always, were everywhere, and I had one pose for me for a few minutes.
A few hours later, and after a much needed breakfast, we were in Seattle. I dropped off Koveh, went home and copied all my photographs to my computer and took my first shower in several days.
15 hours later and I was still in Ansel’s footsteps, now joined by my friends and also a Japanese tourist wearing a moose hat.
You have to be pretty crazy to be wearing a moose hat.
