September is Save Your Photos Month, with the last Saturday designated Save Your Photos Day. Each year during this month you’ll find photo retailers, websites, data storage companies and others reminding you to safeguard your photos. Whether you’re a professional photographer, photo enthusiast or just take family snapshots, it’s a good time to revisit how you’re organizing, describing, storing, and protecting those precious images.
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Even though we have been uncharacteristically and, in many cases, uncomfortably cloistered in our homes for several months now, there does seem to be a light at the end of the tunnel. With the optimistic expectation that we will be unleashed to once again be out in nature creating beautiful images sooner rather than later, the following is a portrait of yet another great photo destination.
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In recent years, Cuba has been a hot spot for photographers seeking fascinating new subjects as well as for those seeking (normal) tourism. A photo trip to Cuba offers the combination of interesting travel photography along with fascinating and informative sightseeing. This small country offers both an exciting city environment as well as a largely unknown countryside. The often prohibited and prohibitive nature of traveling to this close-by island nation only adds to its exotic allure.
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Because I always have something to say and am pleased to share many stories with people, I am often asked to address audiences ranging from the Garden Club of America to National Park visitors and staff to camera clubs. These talks accompany slide shows featuring some of my favorite images of our National Parks and other ‘Scenic Gems of America.’
The Questions
Once my prepared bloviating is done, we open it up to Q&A. The first questions that will invariably come from any audience are,
“What is your favorite national park?” and “What camera do you use?”
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As I write this, the United States, like many other nations, is just beginning to stir after a long shutdown in a Herculean effort to slow the spread of the deadly corona virus pandemic. The great National Parks that I typically write about have been closed to visitors. As spring turns towards summer, some restrictions are easing and people are venturing out of their homes. In the meantime, we’ve spent a lot of time online. I have kept busy editing last winter’s images and re-playing webinars on You Tube while my wife is immersed in Words with Friends and ‘encourages’ me to clean out the garage. We look forward to returning to the gym and continue to diligently do what we can to avoid this horrendous plague.
In late May, Shenandoah National Park took the first steps towards reopening. Conditions vary from place to place, so please check with your park before heading out for a visit. In anticipation of better days ahead, then, it seems like a good time to share the information below.
In the meantime, above all, stay safe!
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During this crucial time, we nature photographers who feel so at home wandering around the great outdoors seeking great images suddenly find ourselves uncharacteristically spending as much time as possible in our homes. While it is certainly necessary that we do this as a means of avoiding the scourge of the deadly Corona virus, it still feels a bit unnatural to most of us.
So let’s make the most of this unexpected downtime by honing our skills in the ever-evolving digital darkroom.
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As I am writing, the country and, indeed, most of the world is shutting down due to the spread of the novel corona virus. There is certainly a lot of information about it in the media so you don’t need me to add to it, especially since, when choosing a career long ago, medicine was not even close to the top of my list. So even though I write regularly about photographing our national parks and other great travel destinations, it is apparent that park visitation and travel in general will be way down for a while to come.
I hope that you will enjoy my description of our sixty-second and newest national park, White Sands, which appears below and will file it away for a calmer and more normal time. For those of us with the travel bug, now is a good time to do some deep and thorough planning for our next trips.
Until then, stay healthy, safe and keep honing your skills in the digital darkroom.
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Over the last several years, I have written in this space about each of the eight wonderful national parks scattered throughout our 49th state. Alaska is so big, wild and open that getting from one of these huge parks to another is not as easy as jumping on the interstate highway system in Ohio and smoothly cruising to somewhere like Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming. It’s a bit more complicated than that.
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For many years, I photographed only landscapes and natural subjects, being careful to avoid anything showing the intrusive hand of man.
Separately, I have been an avid international traveler for all of my adult life. One day, I suddenly got the bright idea to combine my travels with serious image making. Photographing cities is certainly a one hundred and eighty degree U turn from nature photography but, with the proper mindset and viewpoint, it can be just as artistic. Well, almost.
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One of the nation’s newest National Parks is a tiny speck of land on the west bank of the mighty Mississippi River. At a mere 91 acres, Gateway Arch National Park is by far the smallest of our sixty-one National Parks.
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