Congratulations to Gregg B. for winning Feature Thread of the Week with 7 votes - View Previous Winners
So this last week I spent some time camping, hiking, and of course photographing the most northern place I've ever been to. My friend Evan (from Edmonton Canada) was able to book three tent pads (not an easy thing to do, considering that these spots are snatched up within a mere 30 seconds of the park's website opening for reservations each January.) and invited me there.
I've seen a small amount of shots from the place in the past, and they really impressed me, so I agreed and travelled over to the Tombstone Territorial park, Yukon, Canada.
For me this was a quite complicated trip/destination. I've got a flight from Santa Ana, OC directly to Vancouver in British Columbia. From there, another flight to Whitehorse in Yukon. The next day I drove to Dawson City over 6 hours (b/c a small amount of road construction) and from there I took a helicopter flight to the Tombstone park (the next day). So the travel alone lasted (for me) two days and was quite expensive. But.....
The place is just so alluring. The mountains, although not very tall, are jugged and dramatic, and come out on a photograph beautifully. The fall colors are already at their best there. The park itself is practically devoid of any trees, still a few can be found here and there and used as a compositional element to complement the mountains.
Was it raining? Yes, every single day, on and off. But, the weather is so unpredictable I practically experienced all 4 seasons in one day. So just because is overcast and/or rains doesn't mean there won't be a good/colorful sunset. It can all just disappear and the sun will appear for an hour or two.
At night the sky opened up for maybe 30 minutes and I was able to capture a truly amazing show of northern lights as well.
I'm thinking of hitting the place again in the Winter, maybe not mid winter (it's just too cold up there then, and way too much snow) but in September or November where the weather is more stable, much less clouds up in the sky (perfect for Aurora shots) and frozen lakes or ice patterns to shoot with the mountains with.
Quite nice Gregg. I was in that exact place just a few days ago so It appears we were there almost the same time. I couldn't stay too long at Talus Lake, though. I was, however, in Tombstone park for 5 days. It was mostly cloudy with intermittent rains, so I don't know where the auroras you show came from. We didn't see any of them or conditions to view them and we were in sight of Tombstone Mountain and Monolith most every day. Plenty of fine colorful tundra!
Jeffrey wrote:
Quite nice Gregg. I was in that exact place just a few days ago so It appears we were there almost the same time. I couldn't stay too long at Talus Lake, though. I was, however, in Tombstone park for 5 days. It was mostly cloudy with intermittent rains, so I don't know where the auroras you show came from. We didn't see any of them or conditions to view them and we were in sight of Tombstone Mountain and Monolith most every day. Plenty of fine colorful tundra!
Ha. The sky opened up for about 20, maybe 30 minutes on 28th around 1:21 am (looking at the exif data from my camera). We (I was there with a few friends) took all the pics we could in that time. I've got at least 50 shots of aurora. Others took probably more since they were all shooting in auto mode, taking multiple exposures etc.
I did everything manually. And yes, I was at Talus lake that night. I was at Divide a couple of nights prior to that. I didn't get to Grizzly lake but I'll be a frequent quest there from now on. In fact, I arranged with the helicopter pilot a trip in November including a fly by the mountains (for over an hour).
Why not Jacob? We could talk about it and go together. It’s not that difficult and I could guide you and/or help you getting there. You don’t need a lot of money to go either as you will camp in a tent. The helicopter flight isn’t expensive either considering the USD is now a lot stronger than Canadian dollar. The drive from Whitehorse to Dawson city is very cool. No cars on the road, just wilderness and lakes/trees along the way for 5 hours. I enjoyed the ride. You can also fly from Whitehorse to Dawson city.
Anyway, it’s all possible. And the hike is only 4 miles (6KM) so not bad at all. And it doesn’t have much of elevation gain. I hiked it for 3 hours because I was shooting all the time and enjoying the views.
jm10 wrote:
Great shots of a place that most of us will probably never visit...Thanks for the opportunity to behold the great scenes from your journey Gregg!
Bill Gass wrote:
Beautiful shots.
The Northern light shots and seeing them are priceless.
Did you see or hear any wildlife ? ) ( bears, wolves )
Just birds and small furry creatures but that’s about it. No bears. That helicopter pilot told me he have seen only once small black bear there in the last 4 years of flying.
Gregg, what an amazing place and you captured it so well. I got on FM after a very long time due to illness and what treat to see post from you and Peter. Looks like the journey getting to the park was just as enjoyable. Love your work and your passion. Fantastic 👍🏻
Beautiful captures from an amazing place. Definitely on my bucket list. My favourite images are 4 and 6 that show off not only the majestic mountains, but also the beautiful fall tundra.
chez wrote:
Beautiful captures from an amazing place. Definitely on my bucket list. My favourite images are 4 and 6 that show off not only the majestic mountains, but also the beautiful fall tundra.
Thanks Chez!
I see you’re shooting way more now that you retired
I was trying to put my finger on what was so captivating about that first image, then it hit me, it's the seemingly completely different color palette in the foreground water reflection compared to the sky above. I know it's due to the blues and lavenders in the sky that your composition excluded in the top portion, but it gives a rainbow hue effect across the photo that's really wonderful.
Which is not to ignore the rest of your work here, which is all really great. My eyebrows shot up involuntarily at that first aurora image.
JWRisinger wrote:
I was trying to put my finger on what was so captivating about that first image, then it hit me, it's the seemingly completely different color palette in the foreground water reflection compared to the sky above. I know it's due to the blues and lavenders in the sky that your composition excluded in the top portion, but it gives a rainbow hue effect across the photo that's really wonderful.
Which is not to ignore the rest of your work here, which is all really great. My eyebrows shot up involuntarily at that first aurora image.
Thank you JWR. I'm glad you like it. I had some doubts about this image, and thought colors came out shifted towards magenta too much....
Tundra, Aurora, mountains, beautiful sunsets, fog!!! What awesome conditions. A landscape photographers dream. I might hit you up on visit suggestions. I have thought about that area in early fall (actually late summer) to try to capture the tundra colors. We’re there any caribou around?
