The first time I saw a photo of this place, I knew I had to photograph it. Nearly two years later, I took an impromptu trip to the southwest to do just that. I stayed at this location for the better part of three days photographing this viewpoint and a number of other attractions.

This was the first sunset I saw at this spot and by far the best light from the three days there, and I nearly missed it! I had everything set up and framed exactly the way I wanted, but the light just wasn’t cooperating. The sun was going down behind me, though it was completely obscured by cloudcover. It didn’t look like any light was going to break through to highlight this view. Fortunately, I had scouted another location about eight miles away that I knew would look good under cloudy, diffuse light, so I threw everything in the car and zipped off.

This is all public land, though maintenance to the roads is few and far between. The winding, pothole-filled, dusty, rugged gravel roads have no official speed limit, but most of my driving was done at 20 to 30 miles per hour. I had been meandering along toward this other spot for about 10 minutes when I looked back and saw the faintest hint of pink on the rainclouds behind me. Sure enough, a small gap had cleared to the west where the last sunlight of the day was beaming through. I whipped the car around and raced back to the original site, topping 60 miles per hour at times, skidding around turns, blasting through holes, kicking up gravel and dust the entire way. I’m sure the undercarriage of my car isn’t thanking me, but it was totally worth it to arrive right as the light completely lit up these rainclouds.

Over the next few days, I did manage to catch some beautiful light on a number of features in the area. However, this was the one time the entire sky really lit up; I’m fortunate I caught it in the paramount location I had come to photograph. Even though I got this memorable light, I have no doubt I’ll be back to shoot this spot again, probably a number of times. June 2019.