Photographic meanderings

November 13, 2009. Light snowfall on the rims of Yosemite Valley the previous night dust the trees beyond the nose of El Capitan.

My new Tamron 18-270 mm lens arrived yesterday, and so I headed out on 120 to try it out. The Vibration control works up to a point, and is very useful. What delights me is the zoom capability; it’s like shooting with my Olympus C765 again!

This was shot at the west end of the El Capitan meadow, a pullout on the right.

I spent the morning on the El Cap bridge with Tom Evans of ElCapReport.com. He’s a congenial soul, dealing deftly with “tourons” while sharing images and shop-talk with me. I suffered serious lens-lust over his 800mm Canon lens, fitted with an adapter to his Sony camera body. I also was impressed with his sand-bag ballast, draped over the camera. It was a ziplock bag filled with sand! Gotta love that DYI photographer mentality.

Tom easily greeted climbers, got names of people on the wall, shared information on the teams on route. He seems to be someone the climbers check in with after their climbs.

One set of climbers obliged him by posing for the “hero shot”, in bare feet:

Congrats on a safe and successful climb to Ben (in green) and Travis (in white).

Thanks to Tom for the shop-talk, the poster, and a grand view of the graceful and elegant Nipple.

Moonrise over El Capitan, December 24th, 2007

Trees reflected on the Merced River, framed in ice.

It was *cold* at Tunnel View tonight. Next time I’m taking a few blankets and some hot tea with me. I’m glad I stayed, though, because I was rewarded with this lovely view of alpen glow on El Capitan, the first time I’d ever seen it. Dave, you should have stayed, pal. Print available here.