Recommendation for first-time trip to America

[fp56gallery]

I`m contemplating to make a trip to North America. I?m a commited nature

photographer living in Austria and prefer shooting in the mountains. Now I

would like to ask you "America specialists" for recommendations for a 3 to 4

week trip: Where would you go, at which time of year (not too much people

around), to which locations. Have heard great things about the famous indian

summer, Arches Nationalpark, Bryce Canyon Nationalpark, Grand Teton

Nationalpark, ... but where should I begin?

I`d further appreciate any hints about special books about the region

recommended, websites, where to hire a motorhome, ...! I should add that though

I prefer shooting in the mountains at home, I wouldn't exclude any other

interesting part of North America.

Thank you in advance for your support. Franz

[bernard_korites]

I would go to New Mexico, Utah, Arizona, Colorado, Wyoming and Montana. Don't miss the Grand Canyon. Arrange a mule trip to the bottom if you can. As far as renting a motorhome, I would just Google it or contact Winnebago for suggestions.

[bruce_margolis]

Good list. I would add in the Canadian Rockies national parks.

[jeffpolaski]

Franz, see www.nps.gov

 

And enjoy yourself!

[Jerry_]

"Indian summer" depends on the grace of Mother Nature __ the chance of decent autumn weather varies each year.

 

 

 

California has Yosemite and a few mountains, too. And you can find 'unpopulated' areas in Washington State, on the Pacific Coast's Olympic Range of mountains and in the Mt. Rainier area.

[charles_stobbs3]

Better chances for photos if you hike the Grand Canyon, Bright Angel Trail to Indian Gardens, then to Plateau Point. Same route but stop and take pictures when you want. Also the Navajo and Hopi reservations. And don't forget New Mexico, combines Spanish and Indian cultures. See Frommer series of guide books for starters.

[SCL]

Franz - you have a real treat in store for you! I'm a lover of the southwest with its unique topography, as are many others. Any of the choices mentioned are terrific. The only problem is that you're likely to run out of days before you run out of outstanding scenery. Also, in making your plans, take note of the distances between some of these sites...occasionally my European friends are surprised by not being able to see everything because of the travel distances being more than what they are used to in Europe. I'll also toss in a couple of sites in the general area not mentioned above...Mesa Verde, Sedona & Red Rock Country, the Painted Desert. Have a great trip, wherever you end up going.

[michael_yew]

Franz,

 

As for travel guides/books, check out the Phototrip USA books (www.phototripusa.com). They have excellent descriptions and photo tips for the Southwest US. Also consider getting a National Parks pass ($80) if you intend to visit more than four National Parks on your trip. Simply visiting all the National parks/monuments in Utah (Bryce, Zion, Arches, Canyonlands, Capitol Reef, etc.) plus either the Grand Canyon or Yellowstone/Grand Teton should practically pay for your pass.

[fp56gallery]

Thank you all for your help. I think Stephen's advice to plan for less places and take more time for each spot is important. Any more hints for a region with more interesting places without having to travel big distances?

[david_henderson]

In a month, my suggestion would be th fly to Denver about September 20th and spend about ten days photographing some of the best foliage you'll ever see in a mountain environment, especially in the San Juans in the SW of the state. Then west into Utah for the Arches/Capitol Reef/ Bryce/Monument Valley/Antelope/Coyote Buttes/ Zion circuit for ten days in early October. Then Grand Canyon and a short time at each of Sedona and Petrifed Forest brfore heading up to an overnight at Canyon de Chelly and then to Bisti Badlands before returning to Denver via I25.

 

More adventuously you could follow this plan to Zion and then cut across to Death Valley, north to the Alabama Hills and then to Yosemite and explore a bit of the California Coastline before flying back out of San Francisco.

 

And then again there's what I'd do if it were my trip, since I've spent about as much time as I want on red rocks. So for me I'd do ten days in the Colorado Rockies/San Juans; cut south to Bisti and after two weeks take an internal flight from Albuqurque to Portland Oregon, and spend the other two weks driving the length of the Oregon coastline and through northern California to San Francisco. You could incorporate Yosemite in that if it was important to you.

[stwrtertbsratbs5]

My advice is to plan for more than one trip. The dollar is weak, and most of the natives are friendly.

[asnapshot]

All of these are great ideas. I was just up in Bryce and Zion over the Thanksgiving weekend and there was only one regret. I didn't have someone with me to do the driving so I could shoot from the car, (which I got to be very good at doing after traveling for years with someone that only stopped the car when he had too). But the beauty of the areas aren't just in the parks. There's so much landscape between the parks that worth shooting as well. You can check out my gallery in a few days I'm working on uploading the scenic shots.

[alex_lofquist]

If you try to see everything, you won't see enough of anything! I would stick with the area around northern Arizona (Grand Canyon) and southern Utah (Arches, Canyonlands, Bryce, Zion, Capitol Reef). If you still have time then take in the Painted Desert and/or Mesa Verde.

[bernard_korites]

Or you could just put a few "must see" destinations on your itinerary and spend the rest of the time driving around and sampling the local culture. I took a cross country motorcycle trip a few years ago and one of my favorite shots is of a truck stop outside of Kansas City.

 

Pictures of rocks and trees and pretty scenery can get boring and repetitious after a while. I spent some time in Switzerland this spring and took the usual obligatory pictures of mountains and valleys but it's the more offbeat ones taken in the town and villages that I find most interesting.

[stemked]

Of all the reasonably easy sites to get to my personal favorite is Jasper (Alberta) in June particularly if you like the isolation. Yellowstone is wonderful too but to but you need to work a bit harder to get away from the crowds.

 

For birds Florida in winter can be really fantastic especially Sanibel and the Everglades.

 

Just a couple of ideas. There are so many more!

[keith_leonin]

For a European nature photographer who will be coming to the US for the first time:

 

1) The first stop should be the state of ALASKA, and especially Denali National Park. Visit 2 or 3 other parks there.

 

2) From there, go to the Canadian Rockies -- fly into Calgary drive to Jasper, Banff, Lake Louise,etc...

 

3) Then come down to the lower 48 states -- Yellowstone (and surrounding areas) and Grand Canyon (with side trip up to Utah, if time allows) are MUST SEE sites.

 

That should cover about 3-4 weeks.

 

Keith

[b_hall1]

Well...photos of the Okefenokee Swamp are relatively rare...as we can see with all the tourist traps already mentioned here. (Although...I think there is someone here at photo.net with galleries of the Okefenokee.) Then look at the post that mentions Florida and add to it the Keys...

 

But mountains ? Well there's the Appalachian Trail...

 

Honorable mention ? The Outer Banks and Kitty Hawk...the Cape May Ferry...Daytona Beach-away-from-the-revitalized-boardwalk-area...Central Park in NYC...the Eastern tip of Long Island...

 

Out West ? A trail ride down the Grand Canyon ? A rafting trip through the Grand Canyon ? The Oregon Coast ? The salt flats and lakes near Salt Lake City ?

[fp56gallery]

Thank you all for your help. I really appreciate every single piece of advice. What has become clear for me so far is that I will have to come several times to see most of the must see's in Northern America.

For this time I think I should stick to Alex Lofquist's advice: "If you try to see everything, you won't see enough of anything! I would stick with the area around northern Arizona (Grand Canyon) and southern Utah (Arches, Canyonlands, Bryce, Zion, Capitol Reef)." What do you think and what would be the best season to go there?

[alex_lofquist]

Almost any time is good, but I would recommend staying away during the summer months, to avoid the crowds at some locations. Winter with its snows can impart a magic to many of the prime vistas. Springtime offers the colors of blossoms. Autumn brings cool dry weather often appreciated by photographers and travellers. Come and enjoy the land!

[david_henderson]

"I would stick with the area around northern Arizona (Grand Canyon) and southern Utah (Arches, Canyonlands, Bryce, Zion, Capitol Reef). What do you think and what would be the best season to go there?"

 

The exhortation to take your time, & see less in more depth is a mantra often trotted out here to the point that no-one seems to question it, but I do. If I were in USA for the first time a month I'd want to get

 

-more variety than your going to get in a month of photographing red rocks in an arid environment.

 

-photography for a longer part of the days. Nearly every good photograph of red rock country you've ever seen has been made very early or late in the day and there's not a lot to do between these. We can all put up with this for a while, but for a month?

 

-a better opportunity to get my own take on at least some of the photography. The problem with red rock country is that the classic scenes have been photographed to death, and very well. I know people say that by walking a bit you can find your own unique compositions but I've looked at countless of these, and tried it myself and in general found them much less interesting - the classic viewpoints/compositions are that way for a reason.

 

I've given advice on other locations above and I'm not going to repeat it, but simply to suggest that you consider dividing your trip into two -or maybe three- different types of landscape. This will give you a much better perspective on the photographic possibilities in the US for the future and it will -depending on your choices-create the opportunity to make good photographs which are genuinely your own work than you're going to get in red rock land.

 

If you do focus on Utah/Northern Arizona you probably need to add Monument Valley, Antelope Canyon, Coyote Buttes to your list and note that you can and should photograph Cedar Breaks in the late afternoon from a base at Bryce - especially since nearly everything of value you'll get at Bryce is in the first hour of the morning.

 

Time of year? Well December to March/April you'll have the risk of snow which can be very pretty but also make it very difficult to access and drive around. In midsummer its just too hot to be comfortable and the sun rises and sets very quickly. Which leaves spring and autumn. My preference is strongly for the latter (I've done both) partly because sunrise and sunset are at more civilised times and partly because this means less dead time between the two.

[craig_gillette]

I've seen a lot of folks with rentals from Cruise America and El Monte RV. No direct experience with either, just see them a lot.

 

Where to go? That's tough. In the west, the calendar spring/fall tend to be less crowded but perhaps a little more variable from a weather standpoint. You usually have fewer people/smaller crowds before Memorial Day (the end of May) and Labor Day (the beginning of September). Those are both three day weekend holidays and heavy tourist travel times. In between is a combination of the most typical school vacation periods and the likelihood of good weather for most of the country.

 

You could easily spend 4 weeks in California and nearby parts of the desert southwest. The peak flow of water in the rivers and streams in Yosemite is usually right about at Memorial Day (a visit right before the weekend is much less crowded).

 

(Not a route suggestion, just thoughts on spots to consider) The central California coast - Highway 1 from San Luis Obispo west then north up the coast takes you through Big Sur and Monterey. continue north to San Francisco and you are in the bay area and also have more spectacular coast and more coastal redwoods. This is some very spectacular meeting of mountains and coasst for several hundred miles.

 

In northern California and Oregon (maybe north to Washington), you can explore the Cascades and volcanoes. Mt. Lassen, Mt. Shasta, Crater Lake, Mt. Hood, Mt. St. Helens, Mount Rainier (and more).

 

The area of Owens Valley and the east side of the Sierra - basically south from the Lake Tahoe and Reno/Carson City, Nevada, area is high mountain then high desert in the rain shadow of the Sierra, geologically spectacular. There's high dry plains, ancient Mono Lake, ghost towns like Bodie, rugged granite mountains, the remnants of fairly recent volcanic activity.

 

In the high country of the west, the roads may not all be open by Memorial Day - Tioga Pass across the Sierra in Yosemite is often still closed at Memorial Day and even then the high country may have quite a bit of snow. But not too far away - in western terms, the low desert country of Death Valley, Joshua Tree and the Mojave and other deserts is often becoming unbearably hot by late May, early June. Summer to fall is usually pleasant in the high country, the first weekend of October is about the peak of fall color in the eastern Sierra. The only real negative is that the west side, Yosemite Valley, etc., will be pretty dry.

 

The last two weeks of September, first two of October you could explore the Utah area and then also Grand Tetons and Yellowstone. Fall colors and high levels of animal activity in Yellowstone area. The elk are in the rut and moving towards their winter ranges. Some risk of early winter storms though. Depending on park, April or May may still have some snow issues in the high country of the west.

 

Here's the California state parks site:

 

http://www.parks.ca.gov/

[craig_gillette]

ooops. s/b: You usually have fewer people/smaller crowds before Memorial Day (the end of May) and after Labor Day (the beginning of September).

[jordan2240]

Franz,

 

The choices are enormous really. I agree with the idea that you should limit yourself to a specific part of the country, and the West Coast certainly has some beautiful topography. But as one who is from Pennsylvania, the East Coast would certainly be worthy of its own trip. I don't know that you could avoid the tourist crowds, but starting in Maine in early October and winding your way south could prove to be quite rewarding from a photography standpoint. And hopefully I'm not totally off base here, but as an Austrian, you might find some particular interest in visiting Amish country in the Lancaster County area of PA.

[dan_mcclain]

Franz,

I would place my vote for California, because of Joshua Tree National Park, Sequoia/Kings Canyon National Park, but it depends on which sampler pack you are interested in. California has ghost towns, old Spanish missions, deserts, and almost every other type of natural landscape you can imagine. I went to Yosemite last December, and because of all the crowds and tour buses smogging me with fumes at every opportunity, I'll keep returning to Sequoia National Park instead. In fact I'm going there for a bit of snowshoeing later this month. If you live close to the Alps however, you may want to see "The West" which as others have mentioned, would include New Mexico's pueblos, missions, and mountains (many people don't realize that New Mexico has 13000 foot peaks), Utah's stunning national parks, and Arizona's Grand Canyons. For 3-4 weeks I would stick with those three states, or at the most add a one week drive up through Death Valley to the Mono Lake area for the Bodie ghost town and views of the Sierra Nevada. If you decide to come to California, email me and I'll give you whatever advice I can.

[oldowl]

All the above sugestions are good. However,do you have friends in North America? If not then try to make friends with someone here and then visit an area that they know and pick a time that they can show you around. No matter how well you do your homework you will never know it like someone who has lived there or visited it several times over several years. Between your guides knowledge of the area and your new viewpoint you should get the best pictures with the least trouble and worry.