Slot Canyons

In late September, I took a group of 4 participants to a photography workshop in the Page, AZ, area.  The name of the workshop is called Slots Canyon because the highlight of this trip are the slot canyons in Antelope Canyon.  There is a Lower and Upper Antelope Canyon. One is on the north side, the other on the south side of Highway 98, about 15 minutes outside of Page.  The iconic sandstone sculpture is unique and unforgettable.  Once you see it, you will always relate them to the canyons in this area.  They are extremely popular with foreign tourists.  Ironically, many Americans have seen pictures of it but have never been there, including Arizonans who have lived in the state all their lives.

We visited Lower Antelope Canyon twice, each lasting about 2 hours.  Photographing the canyon is a challenge because of the the number of tourists passing through.  Our young guide, Brendon, has some photography background and knows where the good spots are.  He was able to gain cooperation from his fellow guides by stopping the tourists at times to allow us time to take some excellent shots. All of us in the group came away with some beautiful photographs.  Here are some that I captured.

With that many foreign tourists everyday, the Navajo guides have been able to pick up some foreign languages.  Probably the biggest group of tourists are the ones from China.  I heard "kwai tien!" (meaning hurry) and "cho la" (meaning let's go) many times.  The tourists are not supposed to stay and take pictures but if you've come this far and see something so amazing, how can you resist?

Taken with my Nikon camera with some post-processing.  One of my best

Face of an Eagle

A narrow canyon

Beautiful colors in the canyon

A group picture in the canyon

Have to be extra careful climbing down

We had a sunrise shoot at another iconic tourist spot, about 10 minutes outside of Page - the Horseshoe Bend.  Here the Colorado River takes a 270 degree turn around a gigantic rock.  Even though we were there at 5:30am, there were many tourists there already.  It gets more and more crowded as the morning goes on.  Later in the day when we drove by the parking lot, it was entirely full.  Many tourists buses make this one of their key stops.  You will see why by looking at its unique geography below.

Horseshoe Bend

My iPhone camera did not do the picture justice.  You need a wide-angle lens to capture the majesty of the area, including the horizon above this picture.  Unfortunately, I broke my wide-angle lens for my Nikon DSLR camera a couple of days before this at another sunset shoot nearby.  This is the hazard of photography.  You are so engrossed with taking a shot that sometimes you get careless with your equipment.  Most photographers can tell you stories of equipment that they lost or broke.

German girl doing a yoga pose above Horseshoe Dam

We struck up a conversation with a couple of German girls who were there to admire the scenery.  As we were leaving, one of them struck a beautiful yoga pose.  We were all amused.  It was a conversation topic the next couple of days.

We also went to many other places besides the 2 that I mentioned above.  This area, including southern Utah, has very unique geologic formations.  Here are some of them.

Toadstool

Wavy formation at Water Holes

Another Toadstool

One morning we took a river tour down the Colorado River from the Glen Canyon dam to Horse Shoe Bend.  It's a different perspective, seeing the canyon from below.  The rafts are similar to the ones they use for the Grand Canyon River trip that I took several years ago.  They sit above 30 people.

Bridge across Colorado River and Glen Canyon Dam

Another boat on the river

The boats are similar to what are used for the Grand Canyon River rafting trips.

A group picture

Five days went by very quickly.  Perhaps because we were constantly on the go and because we all got along.  There are always different personalities in a group like this but being a small group, there is less friction.  The two older folks did slow us down sometimes but nothing that kept us from taking some excellent photographs.