We left home the first week of June to celebrate our 50th wedding anniversary by visiting some of our favorite national parks. After visiting 13 national parks, numerous monuments, wildlife refuges, recreation areas and national seashores, our adventures came to and end and I am now going to blast the forum with lots of photos. I hope you enjoy coming along with me on this wonderful trip.

This time I will take you to Canyonlands (we actually got up at 5AM to capture sunrise at Mesa Arch). I have also included views of the canyon from Deadhorse State Park. The final view is from the bottom of the canyon. This after a hair-raising truck ride down a steep dirt road. It took three hours to go 20 miles. Never again.

Mesa Arch
Attachment 290413

Sunset from Deadhorse
Attachment 290414

Attachment 290415

After a drive down Shaffer Road
Attachment 290416

[PJ1]

That first shot is brilliant but they a beautiful shots - all of them. Thanks for posting. And congratulations on reaching your 50th. You are a bit ahead of me though. We celebrated our 45th two days ago.

[wtlwdwgn]

Beautiful images Susan!

[slowpez]

Congratulations on the 50 years of bliss and harmony and congratulations on the photos...magnificent.
And what a great way to celebrate the occasion, I take my hat off to you both.
Looking forward to seeing what you do for your 60th.

Thanks for the kind words.

some cool pics in there, thx for the post.

Thanks for looking and commenting.

That first shot is brilliant but they a beautiful shots - all of them. Thanks for posting. And congratulations on reaching your 50th. You are a bit ahead of me though. We celebrated our 45th two days ago.

Congratulations on your 45th. That too is something to be proud of. Glad you enjoyed the photos.

Beautiful images Susan!

Thank you kindly sir.

[joip]

These shots are all amazing. The first one is spectacular!

[Rimfiredude]

Magnifico!

[Kath]

Wonderful shots, Susan. Love that one at Mesa Arch. That iconic view has been my desktop image for the last five years. Nice capture!

[paulh]

Just wow, Susan - what a great set of shots. The first one is a stunner!

[mattb123]

Congratulations on your anniversary!
I know this area well and your photos look great! Were there many people at Mesa Arch?
I know Shafer Trail too, it's my nemesis on my bike going up. So hard at that point in the loop! Mineral Bottom is maybe a little better but not much.

[eaglem]

Exceptional images, have you thought about doing HDR in processing them?

[bscott]

We left home the first week of June to celebrate our 50th wedding anniversary by visiting some of our favorite national parks. After visiting 13 national parks, numerous monuments, wildlife refuges, recreation areas and national seashores, our adventures came to and end and I am now going to blast the forum with lots of photos. I hope you enjoy coming along with me on this wonderful trip.

This time I will take you to Canyonlands (we actually got up at 5AM to capture sunrise at Mesa Arch). I have also included views of the canyon from Deadhorse State Park. The final view is from the bottom of the canyon. This after a hair-raising truck ride down a steep dirt road. It took three hours to go 20 miles. Never again.

Mesa Arch
Attachment 290413

Sunset from Deadhorse
Attachment 290414

Attachment 290415

After a drive down Shaffer Road
Attachment 290416

Susan, these are some of the best shots that I have seen of these monuments. I am looking forward to additional posts of more photos. Your comments on equipment problems is disturbing any additional comments on why and how?

[slowpez]

These shots are all amazing. The first one is spectacular!

Thank you.

Magnifico!

Thanks. Appreciate it.

Wonderful shots, Susan. Love that one at Mesa Arch. That iconic view has been my desktop image for the last five years. Nice capture!

My favorite shot too. Glad you liked it.

Just wow, Susan - what a great set of shots. The first one is a stunner!

Thanks Paul.

Congratulations on your anniversary!
I know this area well and your photos look great! Were there many people at Mesa Arch?
I know Shafer Trail too, it's my nemesis on my bike going up. So hard at that point in the loop! Mineral Bottom is maybe a little better but not much.

Mesa Arch was packed as you can imagine. We arrived really early but it didn't make much difference. Late arrivals just pushed the early birds aside. Drove me nuts.
I thought Shafer Road was bad and we didn't attempt the return but drove on through to Moab. Believe it or not, Monument Valley turned out to be worse. My bones and teeth will never be the same.

Exceptional images, have you thought about doing HDR in processing them?

Thanks EM. Might give that a try.

Susan, these are some of the best shots that I have seen of these monuments. I am looking forward to additional posts of more photos. Your comments on equipment problems is disturbing any additional comments on why and how?

Both the 16-45 and 16-25- just froze. Wouldn't focus, the barrel wouldn't move and just became useless. Tried both lenses on the K5 and the K3. Didn't make any difference.
The 300 with the 1.4 TC really gave me fits and almost broke my heart. We were at Bosque del Apache specifically for the birds and it just wouldn't focus at all. It hunted like crazy. I took the TC off and the 300 worked fine. Put the TC on the 16-85 and it worked fine. The camera worked fine. It was just that combination. I cleaned the contacts, etc but nothing seemed to help. Quit using it for a while and finally took the time to put the combo back on the camera, went in and changed all the settings back to factory specs and everything is back to working order. I have a user program for birds and I think I may have inadvertently changed something without realizing it. I have no idea what but have taken a few hundred more shots without any problems. Not helpful info I know but it is all I've got. Will not have the 16-45 fixed and most probably will not have the sigma repaired either. It had issues with PF and vignetting before it stopped working.

[mattb123]

Mesa Arch was packed as you can imagine. We arrived really early but it didn't make much difference. Late arrivals just pushed the early birds aside. Drove me nuts.
I thought Shafer Road was bad and we didn't attempt the return but drove on through to Moab. Believe it or not, Monument Valley turned out to be worse. My bones and teeth will never be the same.

Oh, Pot Ash road is notoriously bad! My condolences!

[usn ret]

Susan these are some really great photos, now when are you going to show us the good ones? Congratulations on the Golden Anniversary. I/we did ours in January. We looked at some very young kids in some 50 year old photos, wow! Did you break out your old photos? Cliff

[Bruce Clark]

A wonderful set. This place is on my bucket list.

[lenticular]

Congratulations on celebrating 50 years together and congratulations on those beautiful photographs.
We travel back to the UK in late Feb through to March, to celebrate my dad's 90th birthday and my parents' 60th Anniv.