The Unknown

A friend and I stayed a few days in the Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Park area with the goal of night photography. One location we really wanted to try was Grand Prismatic Spring because of its colors. We scoped it out during the day. Turns out this was also the ONLY place that we saw a grizzly bear track. It looked to be relatively fresh and quite large. The bear had walked on the boardwalk, and where it divides the bear stepped off and went to the center of the boardwalk loop.

          Night came and we headed out. We only took our headlamps, cameras on their tripods and bear spray, careful not to have any smelly stuff with us that a bear may think it wanted. We set up and started shooting. This was the most difficult place I have ever shot. To try to capture Grand Prismatic my camera had to be really high and therefore the tripod was spread out on that narrow boardwalk. I had visions of being that “stupid” tourist that fell in! There were elk bugling, wolves howling all in the open field just west and north of us. This went on for a while. About the time we were figuring out our settings and how to get the color of the spring there was a hair-raising noise from the trees we had to walk by to get to the spring. One thing about night photography you get comfortable being uncomfortable … to an extent. However, I always follow that little inner voice that says you’re safe or not! I knew the noise was either a buffalo or a grizzly bear. I am pretty sure it was the buffalo we saw earlier in the area, but I did not want to be surprised by either “b” word. I told my friend I was out and we were leaving. She says, “It’s better to be a live chicken than a dead duck.” So true. We chose to be chickens.

          This photo is the bridge leading to Grand Prismatic Spring. We stayed on the bridge about another hour shooting. A car happened to drive by while I was shooting this photo and lit up the steam and the boardwalk going up the hill by the trees with “the unknown” creature that turned me into a chicken.  Live chickens we were, I can handle a lot not stuck on a boardwalk with scalding water all around me.

Captured by Johanna Thompson at Yellowstone National Park

Gear: Canon EOS 6D with Sigma 14-24mm f/2.8 lens

Single nightscape image:

14mm, 20 sec., F/2.8, ISO 6400,