I hadn’t photographed the full moon since May, too many clouds in June, July looked good so I started to make a plan to shoot Bryce Canyon full moon hoodoos, and it worked. I took lots of photos. Hope you’re ready.
I’m still learning to use the Photo Pills app ahead of time for some idea of time, degrees, and direction of rise (or set) from different locations. Plus considering which trail to get down into the hoodoos without too much distance and drop.
I started down the Navajo Loop Trail about 7:15 for the 8:10 moonrise and maybe the 8:50 sunset.
Looking up from four switchbacks down
Couldn’t believe how many people clustered along the rim and top of the trailhead at the mostly eastern “Sunset Point” view.
Wallstreet, the other side of the Navajo Loop Trail
A few folks passed me still huffing up the trail, many carrying no water. They may have done the 1.3 mile loop, 357 feet up in .7miles. Not for me tonight.
I kept checking Photo Pills against the real time landscape.
At first I was sure I’d get the moon rise through one of the windows in a formation I call the mask. But alas, the app was out of calibration.
Yet I knew it was close and went for a backup plan. Wherever the moon would rise I’d surely find a good hoodoo foreground.
Had to keep moving up and down the trail because the gnats/noseeums were driving me crazy, and ultimately ate me alive leaving terrible welts that got hard bumps and blisters. Brutal. A reaction I’d never experienced before, and hope not to again.
With a bit of haze on the horizon I didn’t get the actual moon rise but I did get some fun shots of the full moon with the magical shapes of hoodoos. I saw a person reading a book and someone else said a knight holding a staff or sword. What do you see?
Hoodoo is a word derived from late 1800 African Americans in the southeastern United States meaning “folk magic”. I can’t find out who actually named these crazily carved and magical shaped rocks. Zoomed in and zoomed out.
A different view than from the top of the iconic Thor’s Hammer hoodoo.
I had so much fun.
After my shoot on the climb up to the rim I stopped a young boy, maybe tweenage, from driving his remote control 18-inch car down the trail. No motorized vehicles allowed. Even though I wasn’t in uniform, told him I was a Ranger, and he asked if he could drive it back up and I said “no, carry it.” Which he did with no other response. Where were his parents?
To avoid crowds and for someplace different, the next night I went to Fairyland Point. For the first time I found a place to park in the tiny lot. Arrived at 8:25 for an 8:49 sunset and 8:58 moon rise.
The trail had obviously been walked on when wet and was lumpy and uneven which made for unsteady slow walking. I should have brought my tripod and used it as a walking stick. Thank goodness a light breeze kept most of the bugs away.
Scoped a couple places out with Photo Pills but didn’t feel like I could trust it 100% even with recalibrating the previous night.
I would have had to walk a little further than I wanted to get below the hoodoos for the shots I imagined. But with the hazy horizon I didn’t catch the first rise anyway.
A young woman and her “Sherpa” coming up the trail with “$1000s in camera gear” hadn’t even seen the full moon. She joined me setting up her tripod. Hope she got some better shots than I did as darkness deepened.
I like to walk a trail under full moon light, to see the shadows, and wished for my tripod to take more photos.
Processing these shots took a lot of time, going from silhouette to pulled shadows for a little more color. I most time preferred the dark silhouette. How about you?
This experience gave me the idea for a Shooting the light full moon walk about balance in nature, photography, and life. Possibly in September.
But now that monsoon has finally arrived it’s rather hit or miss for clear skies to full clouds. Yet I’m still working on a plan for August Bryce Canyon full moon hoodoos. I’m off work the 14th for an 8:17 moon rise five minutes before sunset. My work schedule on the 15th has me closing the visitor center at 8pm so I’ll probably miss the 8:20 sunset but should be able to make the 8:51 moon rise somewhere behind the hoodoos.
