Picture of the Day - 2/14/2010

Another double header! Today, I photographed the sunrise with Telescope Peak reflecting in Badwater, Death Valley, CA. I had to walk quite a ways out on crusty salt formations to the edge of the water. As I left Death Valley for Reno, I stopped at the Alabama Hills Recreation Area (now managed by the BLM), located west of Lone Pine. Many old (and new) westerns were filmed here - Hopalong Cassidy, The Lone Ranger, How the West Was Won, Rawhide, Gunga Din, Maverick (new one), Tremors, High Sierra and Charge of the Light Brigade. Stars included Gene Autry, Gregory Peck, James Garner, Mel Gibson and Gary Cooper and several others. This well-known arch (to photographers, anyway) is located just to the north of the main movie locations and is about a 1/4 mile walk from the parking area. It frames Mt. Whitney (small grayish peak just right of center), the largest peak in the continental US at 14.495 feet. I've climbed it twice via the trail and nearly a third time where we managed to get about 3/4qtrs of the way up the face, until lightning chased us back down (20+ pitches of rappelling very quickly!).