09/02/2025
Birthday Alert! For me, today marks 44 laps around that great big ball of fire in the sky. What a marvelously beautiful year it was, one that filled me to the brim with joy over and over. Here are a handful of my favorite moments of photography from the last 12 months.
1) Overlooking Bench Lake in Kings Canyon National Park after discovering this ridge view by accident, my birthday last year.
2) Once-in-a-lifetime sunrise conditions I saw in Kings Canyon last Tuesday. o_o
3) A spectacular glacial valley cutting through the mountains of northern Pakistan, April.
4) Finding the most perfect little waterfall in a random Sierra stream, August.
5) Aoraki / Mt Cook and lenticular clouds, taken during a drool-inducing helicopter flight in New Zealand, October.
6) The aurora borealis dancing over Mono Lake, October.
7) Finding one of the coolest formations I've encountered in the Death Valley sand dunes, January.
8) Intense pre-dawn alpenglow hits the Palisades, some of the highest peaks in the contiguous USA. July.
9) One of the fiercest sunsets I saw in 2025 erupting over the Chalfant Lakes in the John Muir Wilderness.
10) Fall color arriving Lone Pine and a stroll in the neighborhood found me next to these stunning cottonwoods, with Mt Whitney in the background. November.
11) Comet ATLAS-Tsuchinshan "colliding" with Mt Whitney. October.
12 Clearing storms reveal the massive fjords of Doubtful Sound, one of the most incredible places I've ever visited. November.
13) A nearly full moon setting over a snow-clad Mt Whitney at sunrise. March.
14) Another drool-inducing scenic flight in New Zealand, this time over Fiordland National Park, possibly the most beautiful place on the planet. October.
15) After getting a very late start climbing, I found myself at the summit of University Peak (13,500') just as the sun was setting. It was a huge PITA climbing down in the dark, but worth it for this view. July.
16) A glorious sunrise unfolding over my favorite place in the world: the Kings Canyon backcountry.
17) Your new best friend. (I wish).
Last year is going to be hard to beat, but looking at the calendar for my 44th year, I think it could be a serious contender.
