I went on an outing to Mammoth Mountain with the Rancho Photo Club to shoot autumn colors. I’m neither a member nor a photographer—I tagged along as ‘spouse of member.’ It was an educational experience. Photo shoots require a great deal of running back and forth on the same stretch of highway and a whole lot of waiting for the light. The daybreak shoots didn’t fit my schedule, but I went along for the ride of a few others.
To say there were colors is misleading. There was yellow. The Sierra, lacking maples, is pretty exclusively decorated with the gold of aspens and cottonwoods. That’s not to say they weren’t spectacular.
Don’t get the idea that an accomplished photographer took these shots. It was me with my hand-me-down point-and-shoot camera.
The highlight of the trip was a sunset shoot at Mono Lake. That was a rather weird trip, but I learned a lot about the place. Did you know that Mono Lake is more than twice as salty as the ocean, and from the fifties to the nineties, it was a major source of drinking water for Los Angeles. The water level was drained by forty feet vertically. Then, of course, there was a big move to “Save Mono Lake” and the tap was closed. This raises two interesting points. The big attraction at Mono is the tufas. Otherworldly outcroppings of calcified stuff.
The photo shoot took place at South Tufa where I don’t believe there were any tufas more than forty feet tall, therefore, if Los Angeles hadn’t raided the lake, the main attractions would be underwater. The other thing is that salinity business. If it was economically feasible to desalinate the water drawn from Mono Lake, why isn’t it feasible to desalinate seawater?
There were a surprising number of photography groups at South Tufa. In addition to my own great photographer, there was some joker making an Arabic music video, a native drummer having what looked like an out of body experience, a bunch of Japanese kids taking selfies, and I was later told there was a naked girl making promotional shots for a movie or something. I complained bitterly about only being informed of that last fact after we left the lake.
Clockwise from left: Great Photographer, bonehead Arab singer, spiritual drummer. Sorry, no naked girl.
This one tufa drew particular attention. The group waited breathlessly for that moment when the sun, having sunk below the horizon, reflects rosy light from the underside of clouds, and illuminates the subject in some preternatural glow. The first shot is in direct sunlight, the second is reflected light. Remember, I said there was a great deal of standing around waiting for the light? Full sun is on the left, reflected light is on the right.
Before leaving the Mammoth area, we visited the Devil’s Post Pile. I’m not sure what a post pile is, but surely the Devil must have one, and this is it. A very weird pile of rocks.
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