The Narrows Gorge Zion National Park #1

I took this picture when I hiked The Narrows Gorge in Zion National Park. This was an awesome experience and the scenery was of course incredibly beautiful. The Narrows is known as a "slot gorge" because of it narrow width. This shot was taken at a point where the gorge is actually quite wide. At parts we had to hike through water that was up to our necks even though it was late summer. You have to be concerned about thunderstorms as they can cause the water level to rise fast. Keeping the camera out of the water was my main concern. The place where we rented out hiking gear had these cool hip bags for your camera that kept it dry.

If you ever do this or a similar hike, make sure you rent or buy the special boots that have grip on the slippery rock, and make sure you use a polel to help keep yourself upright, but expect to end up in the drink at least once nonetheless. Our entire party all fell into the water by the end of it. Take it as part of the experience, and the water's warm anyhow, at that time of the year at least.

Camera: Canon EOS 20D
Exposure: 0.017 sec (1/60)
Aperture: f/13
Focal Length: 18 mm
ISO Speed: 200

River Canyon Fiordland National Park

This beautiful river runs alongside the road to Milford Sound for a short part of the journey. This was taken fairly early in the morning, so the shadows were still very long and there was mountain valley fog everywhere.

The Whanganui River

Whanganui River from the Gentle Annie Hill

Wanganui, (the local spelling drops the "h"), is actually the town I grew up in in New Zealand. Situated at the mouth of the Wanganui River, the city is nicknamed "The River City". The river is rich in Maori and early-European history, and in the last decade or so the river was designated "The Whanganui River National Park". The river is the second longest in New Zealand after the Waikato River.

This photo was taken from the River Road from the top of the Gentle Annie Hill from which you get a commanding view of the river valley.

Virgin River Zion in Winter

Zion National Park Virgin River in Winter

Zion is one of the National Parks in Utah and one of my favorites to visit. It is a far more intimate experience than the Grand Canyon, and has a range of hikes that are easily accessible.

I took this photo on my first visit to Zion in February of 2006. I have since been back twice, in the spring and summer of 2006. Of course it was a different experience each time because of the different seasons. This first visit was in the winter. The slopes and peaks were covered in snow, and the trees were bare. This photo with the Virgin river in the foreground paints a bleak and wintery picture. It wasn't quite this bleak looking in reality - I actually have deliberately adjusted the image to give it this very wintery feel. The rock at Zion is in fact very red, and if you want to get some idea of what the original image looked like, here it is:

Even this doesn't really show you just how red the rock is as so much color is lost in converting the image file to jpeg and making it small for the web. Believe me, the rock is much redder than appears here.