Siskiyou County

• Rainer Maria Rilke.

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This time when we visited Mt Shasta, it was as a destination that as a pass through point like the last two times. So I did my usual research and came up with two lake locations from where I could shoot the mountain reflections. One was the heart lake location which required a pretty serious hike and the other was the more popular location near Lake Siskiyou.

I have used the TPE app and calculated that sunrise would be my best chance to get some golden light on the mountain and hoped that thick cloud cover would clear and reveal the mountain. As we got close to the lake I realized that the lake itself had a thick layer of fog above it and I had no chance of a decent shot. But the eternal optimist in me still dragged most of my stuff to the lake shore and waited for the sun to rise and clear some of the clouds and fog.

Thankfully my persistence paid off and some of the fog and clouds cleared to let some light in, albeit for a brief period. Fortunately I had set everything up so all I had to do was click away. Hope you all like it and I get to come back here after the storm has passed.

• Mary Webb.

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Another shot of Lake Siskiyou sunrise near Mt. Shasta. We happened to visit during a flash storm and basically this was all the clear sky we saw the whole weekend we were there. We met a local landscape photographer while we were there and he didn’t even take his camera out while he was there choosing to play with his kids instead. Later he told me that morning was a wash and that just got me thinking on how amazing sunrises at that location usually are if he didn’t even bother to shoot and here I was thinking that this was pretty awesome.

Hopefully I’ll get to comeback soon and see it for myself.

• Thomas a Kempis.

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As a landscape photographer, I like the idea of planning for a perfect landscape image. In fact, photo pills and the photographer’s ephemeris are the only two paid apps on my phone. Unfortunately, as a travel photographer, I rarely get to plan for the perfect landscape image. It is usually a lot of adjusting to the conditions. But so far, I have been unusually successful with moonrises and moonsets in my photography.

I saw this barn on our first trip to Mt Shasta on our way out of town. On our second visit, I couldn’t find the location. By our third visit, I had found the site and was ready, only to watch helplessly as a freak winter storm completely conceal the mountain for the entire time we were there. The fourth visit turned out to be the lucky one, I was right there at sunset, and it went perfectly except for the presence of any clouds, but the rising moon more than made up for it. The moon was rising a bit to the left of the ideal composition, so I made this shot into a stitched panorama of three shots while keeping the focal length at the long end of my 24-70. I liked how this image turned out especially the light on the mountain and the barn and the rising moon's surprise presence.

• Thomas Jefferson.

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Another old shot from one of our earlier trips to beautiful northern California. Mt Shasta and the nearby areas are some of our favorite spots in California and this area has everything a for a landscape photographer. There are massive mountain peaks of Shasta and Lassen, numerous waterfalls including some of the biggest on the west coast etc. During this visit, a huge winter storm passed by the area and we experienced rain on almost every day.

I have learned that rainstorms are not all doom and gloom but provide some unique opportunities to photographers. One of the best after effect of rain is mini lakes that they create everywhere. I took this shot by the highway near Shasta airport which is usually an unremarkable spot you pass by on Rt 5. But on this morning the rain relented a bit and the puddle provided me with excellent reflections. Unfortunately, the storm outlasted our time there and I was not able to witness my other favorite opportunity of winter storms, the clearing storm.

• Buddha.

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Today’s post is an old shot from our visit to Mt Shasta earlier this year. While we were there a sudden winter stormed passed through and dusted everything with tons of snow and rain. I heard about this location which is closer to the Weed airport from a local photographer we met at sunrise. He advised us that the rain pools that usually forms provides excellent refection of the mountain.

While we reached the pools in the afternoon we were hoping catch a glimpse of the mountain and our prayers were answered, only a little too literally. We could see Mt Shasta in all its full glory for about 2 minutes before the low lying clouds engulfed the mountain. Thankfully we had better luck with Black butte which had a perfect dusting of snow and a good enough reflection when a mid tele lens was used.

• Lao Tzu.

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One more shot of the beautiful Mossbrae falls. I wanted to use a short tele focal length to see more details on the strands of water and the moss covered rocks. we really enjoyed being at these falls all by ourselves and having the time to relax and take photos. Once the proposed hiking path gets completed, I hope it won't become too much commercialized.

Thanks for visiting and have a nice Monday.

• Leo Tolstoy.

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So on the last day of our summer road trip, we planned to get to the beautiful little town of Dunsmuir by evening. I had an alternative reason for this timing, Mt Shasta. Since my first visit to Mt Shasta some 4 years ago, I have been fascinated by the southernmost peak of the Cascade Range and the nearby small towns.

We came across this mount and the barn as we were done with the shoot and heading back to the hotel. The sun has already set but there was still the warm glow left in the sky. Plus the moon had risen to complement the mountain and the spectacular sky. Thankfully the road was pretty empty so I could jump out and set up my shot before the light faded.

• Francis Bacon.

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This is an old shot from our trip to Northern California earlier this year. We were there at the same time a massive winter storm was hitting the area. So photo taking opportunities were very limited due to the cloud cover blocking the entire mountain. We had just finished a sunrise shot at Lake Siskiyou with mixed results and were driving back to get a well-earned breakfast when I noticed the sun breaking through the clouds just as we were driving over the box canyon dam.

So I grabbed my gear and took a couple of shots before escaping back into the warmth comfort of the car. This is one of the good shots looking straight at the Sacramento River taken from top of the Box Canyon Dam.

I've been seeing quite a few shots of this amazing waterfall in my photostream recently, so I decided I'd post a 7-shot panorama I captured last...

• Leo Buscaglia.

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One of the biggest advantages of being a consultant by profession is the small breaks you get while you are in between projects. Only this time we had some personal setbacks and I had to be out of country for nearly a month. So when I was back we had a week before my new project started and decided to head to northern California for a quick road trip.

One of the places I really wanted to visit Mossbrae falls near Dunsmuir, CA. It's one of the difficult hikes to do as the path is an active railway track and they will give out a ticket if they catch you parked near the tracks you most certainly will get a ticket. So we had to park pretty far away and did the hike in the early morning to get to the waterfall. This was one of the prettiest waterfalls I have ever been to. And the sheer size of it and the noise the river makes was pretty impressive. Hope you all like this pano shot I made of the entire waterfall. Thanks again for visiting.

-Wilma Rudolph.

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Here is another old shot from our Oregon road trip. This one is a Panorama shot of the mighty Mt Shasta with a road lading up to the mountain while it is illuminated by the last rays of the sun. I love the this road where we took this shot as every turn and curve has awesome views of the mountain. I had almost forgot about this shot until couple of days ago when I was backing up my data files and saw this one.

This one is a pano stitch image of about 15 shots and was taken just seconds before the last light of the day was gone. I had seen a barn on this road the last time we were there and was driving around to find it but couldn't and my wife was yelling at me not to waste the sunset. so finally I gave in and pulled to the side to take this shot.

Hope you all like it, and Happy new Year!!

• Oliver Cromwell.

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After visiting Lower Proxy falls and exploring the Three Sisters Wilderness area we headed out for Redding, California which was to be our last stay for this trip. It was a long drive and since we started quite late we decided to head straight to the hotel and forego Crater Lake for this trip.

We reached Mt Shasta by sunset time and since Redding was quite near decided to do a sunset shoot of the might mountain. The last time I was here I remember seeing a Red Barn with Mt Shasta in the background. We wasted quite a bit of time looking for it without any luck but the cloud formations around the mountain was much better than the last time and I had a blast shooting in the beautiful sunset light.

• Rumi.

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I have been to Mt Shasta about 4 or 5 times now and this location has been one that eluded me the most. I first saw this location on our very first trip as we headed north and made a mental note to return when we had more time. So we returned next year but we had a problem, I completely forgot which road I took the shot from and we had no luck finding the spot even after driving around for close to 2 hours. I returned home with a mission and scoured the roads around Mt Shasta on google street view until I finally found the location. I marked the location on my maps and we returned in early spring to the spot 3rd time. Only a winter storm hit the exact same day we arrived and Mt Shasta stayed hidden by clouds the whole week we were there.

So while we were coming back from our summer road trip to Oregon, we planned it so that we will be by the barn just before sunset. This was the shot I made at the barn with the beautiful Mt Shasta behind lit up by beautiful golden sunset light. I would have preferred some clouds to add some drama but I waited for 4 years I can do a bit more.