In August, the remnants of Hurricane Hilary dropped more than two inches of rain in one day in Death Valley -- more than their average annual total rainfall. That event caused flash flooding and wreaked havoc in the park, but it also created a beautiful, temporary salt lake in Badwater Basin, the lowest point in North America at 288 feet below sea level. At its largest, the lake was 7 miles long, 4 miles wide and 2 feet deep. For a short time, people could even kayak in its waters. I visited last weekend to see this beautiful, weird, climate-change created phenomenon, and was treated to a beautiful sunset and eerie reflections. Beautiful, rare, ephemeral.

Tags:   death valley national park death valley lake manley manly badwater basin desert winter reflection sunset

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I rang in the New Year in Costa Rica and was treated to this unbelievable sunset in Manuel Antonio. I realize this looks like some Generative AI dream but it was 100% real! Captured on my Mavic Mini 3 Pro.

Tags:   costa rica Manuel antonio panorama sunset tropical paradise aerial dji mini 3 pro

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The first real rain of 2023 in the Santa Cruz Mountains cleared with a bang, revealing this stunning rainbow right at sunrise. I captured this panorama with my DJI Mini 3 Pro.

Tags:   Santa Cruz Mountains rainbow panorama sunrise aerial fog storm

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I recently spent time in Monument Valley and had the incredible privilege of visiting Hunt's Mesa, a remote place overlooking some of the most beautiful parts Navajoland.

What a breathtaking, inspiring, ancient place where you can see millions of years of Earth's development laid before your eyes.

While I was there, I learned about the core Navajo concept of "Beauty", "Hózhó", which means everything being in balance with each other. I thought that the act of naming that concept "beauty" is itself beautiful.

I feel so inspired by the "Walking in Beauty" blessing, which starts:

In beauty I walk
With beauty before me I walk With beauty behind me I walk
With beauty above me I walk With beauty around me I walk
It has become beauty again

Thank you to Navajoland, and to the Navajo people I met while there for inspiring me.

Tags:   monument valley southwest desert mesa arizona navajo nation navajoland monument valley sunrise hunts

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We were incredibly lucky to witness the annular eclipse over the stunning landscape of Monument Valley. For the previous week, clouds threatened the forecast, but the morning dawned without a cloud in the sky. This is a composite of an image captured at sunrise when the sun broke over the horizon, then layered with images of the sun in the various stages of the eclipse captured through a 400mm lens with a solar filter. I've stacked them in the frame where they appeared in real life as closely as possible. What a spectacular day!

Tags:   annular eclipse monument valley Arizona Utah mittens desert composite total

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