About the Photo: Route 66 Sitgreaves Pass
Near the top of the pass I found this viewpoint that captured the curves going down the road towards Oatman. I love how the road snakes through the scene around the dominant mountain on the left. Even though this was taken later in the morning when the light was harsher, I really like how this photo turned out. A major part of that is the fact that the clouds in the upper right mirror the shape of the mountains on the left to help balance the scene. Also the complimentary colors of the blue sky working alongside the orange of the Arizonan desert. This is a 7 shot stitched pano to take in the full grandeur of the scene in front of me.
The great American roadtrip, the dream of many people. I idea of hopping into your car and traveling all over the country to take in the different sites and cultures that make America so diverse. I’ve been lucky enough to take two cross country trips in my life and I can never get enough of it. In August of 2021 I took my mom on a trip that she had always dreamed of making. Over the course of 16 days, my mom and I traveled 6,253 total miles as we drove from Maryland to Chicago then traveled Historic Route 66 all the way to Santa Monica. We then drove back to Maryland from California hitting a few national parks along the way. The journey was amazing even if it feels like forever to drive across Kansas.
Canon R5 with Canon RF 24-70mm Lens f/8.0 1/320 ISO 100 7-Shot Pano at 29mm
While there were many amazing sites along route 66, between the historic buildings, cars and touristy roadside attractions, our favorite state that we traveled through was Arizona. Visiting Petrified Forest and Grand Canyon National Parks along with smaller NPS sites like Sunset Crater, Walnut Canyon and Wupatki were definitely highlights of the state. The main highlight though was Route 66 itself. Small towns like Holbrook, Seligman and Oatman with their charm, old hotels and tourist attractions. My favorite section of all of Route 66 was the Oatman Highway which crosses Sitgreaves Pass. This 8 mile section of Route 66 is also dubbed The Sidewinder due to having 191 curves and switchbacks. The road is very narrow with a speed limit is 15 MPH in some sections. This is very doable in a car but not recommended if you are in a RV.
Near the top of the pass I found this viewpoint that captured the curves going down the road towards Oatman. I love how the road snakes through the scene around the dominant mountain on the left. Even though this was taken later in the morning when the light was harsher, I really like how this photo turned out. A major part of that is the fact that the clouds in the upper right mirror the shape of the mountains on the left to help balance the scene. Also the complimentary colors of the blue sky working alongside the orange of the Arizonan desert. This is a 7 shot stitched pano to take in the full grandeur of the scene in front of me.
Let me know down below what you think about this photo or if you have any questions. Have you traveled Route 66 and if so, which section was your favorite?
About the photo: Mountain Bluebird
I love how this photo turned out. The pose of the bluebird is nice with a nice side profile shot and him being on the top of the broken tree. The cooler colors of the bird and background contrast nicely with the warm tones of the burnt broken tree. The thing that really puts this photo over the top for me is the rain streaks I was able to capture even with a fast shutter speed.
Last year I was trying to come up with where I wanted to go on vacation. As I was talking to my parents about it, my mom mentioned how she always wanted to see Yellowstone National Park. I decided that I would take her so she could check it off her bucket list. I had been to Yellowstone before in 2018 and absolutely loved the wildlife and geothermal features of the park so of course I was more than happy to go back again. After a couple months of planning, it was time for our trip. The day was June 4th and we departed on our five hour flight into Salt Lake City. We landed and hopped into our rental car where we drove another five hours up to West Yellowstone to our hotel at the White Buffalo.
Canon R5 with Canon 100-500mm Lens f/7.1 1/500 ISO 2000
After getting settled and getting some dinner, we had to make our way into the park to get a little taste even if it was for only a couple hours. It was overcast with spells of rain on the way into the park. While driving along the West Entrance Road we saw our first bison of the trip. We stopped on the shoulder and took it in for a minute before heading further into the park. We made our way to Madison Junction where we decided to head south. We pulled into the Firehole Canyon Road to drive the one way road and check out the views. We spent a minute or two at Firehole Falls before heading back out to the main road. We headed a little further south as the the rain picked up and the sky grew darker.
We pulled into Fountain Flat Drive and drove to the parking lot at the end of the road. There was a bison that I was trying to photograph in the distance when this beautiful mountain bluebird caught my eye. He kept flying around and wouldn’t set still as I had trouble keeping up with where he flew to. As I was about to give up and leave to go back to our hotel, he landed on this beautiful broken tree. I stepped out of our car and fired off a handful of shots before he flew away to not be seen again.
I love how this photo turned out. The pose of the bluebird is nice with a nice side profile shot and him being on the top of the broken tree. The cooler colors of the bird and background contrast nicely with the warm tones of the burnt broken tree. The thing that really puts this photo over the top for me is the rain streaks I was able to capture even with a fast shutter speed.
Let me know down below what you think about this photo or if you have any questions.