Terra Galleria Photography

Archive for February 2010

New images: Bryce Canyon National Park

I’ve posted new images of Bryce Canyon National Park. That park presents the photographer with a dream and a challenge. It offers one of the most striking sights anywhere, the hoodoos of the Bryce Amphitheater, but once you’ve photographed them, what else new can you do ? On my last visit, in 2008 (my 4th) […]

Photo Spot 14: Yellowstone National Park – Grand Prismatic Springs and Great Fountain Geyser

Established in 1872, Yellowstone National Park is America’s first national park. Although Yellowstone preserves a large terrain with varied resources such as mountains ranges, lakes, rivers, waterfalls, canyons, and large wildlife, it was created and is mostly known for geothermal features. There are as many of them in Yellowstone than in the rest of the […]

Images of Vietnam on exhibit at Northeastern University, Boston

A dozen of my images from Vietnam are on display in the ISSI Carnavale exhibit at the Northeastern University’s Gallery360 from February 22 to March 20, 2010. I was not able to attend the opening, however, I will give a lecture, scheduled at 3:00 pm on Friday, March 12th. In Vietnamese, the same word is […]

Photo Spot 13: Grand Teton National Park – Schwabacher landing

Among all the mountains in America, the Grand Tetons – rocky, jagged, and abruptly rising seven thousand feet above the valley of Jackson Hole – remind me the most of the Alps, on the high peaks where I had my first life-changing wilderness experiences that inspired me to become a photographer. With many lakes laying […]

Mavericks surf contest

I’ve posted images of the Mavericks surf contest which took place this Saturday near Half Moon Bay. This was the first time I attended the event. I’ll give an account of it from a photographer’s perspective. At Mavericks, an unusually-shaped underwater rock formation can cause waves to top out at over 50 feet (15m) after […]

California State Parks and Wildlife Conservation Trust Fund Act

There was a good scare, last summer, when California threatened to close 100 of its state parks because of budget cuts. 100 out of 278, many worthy of being in the National Park system. A closure list was even circulated, but fortunately, it did not go into effect. Instead, maintenance, administrative staff and some facilities’ […]

Photo spot 12: Great Basin National Park – Wheeler cirque

High above the Great Basin Desert in Nevada, the South Snake Range forms a vegetated island protected by Great Basin National Park. At the timberline, groves of Bristlecone pine trees grow, clinging to rocky ridges and cirques. The oldest living things on earth, those trees, with fantastically gnarled shapes and great texture, were already saplings […]

Free Maps of National Parks (and of the rest of the country too)

I just saw National Parks maps in PDF format for sale here. A quick glance at the sample Acadia National Park map was enough to determine that those are in fact the excellent maps produced and distributed by the National Park Service. You may not be aware of that, but everything produced by the US […]

New images: Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park (South Rim)

I’ve posted new images of Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, taken during a trip in May 2009. When I first visited Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, I limited my explorations to the North Rim. Although the relatively recent park doesn’t see many visitors, the North Rim is even more uncrowded, and […]

Photo spot 11: Joshua Tree National Park – Cholla Cactus Garden

Joshua Tree National Park lies at the convergence of two deserts, the Mojave and the Colorado. Joshua trees and granite boulders characterize the windy high Mojave Desert, while at the Colorado Desert’s lower elevations, cactus and native California palm trees thrive among sandy washes occasionally flooded by unpredictable torrents. The Cholla Cactus garden lies right […]