A week ago my wife Joan joined me on my business trip in Utah and we spent the weekend in the San Rafael Swell, about three hours southeast of Salt Lake City. I have been there before and was happy to go back again. This area has everything you may expect in Utah, mountains, desert, canyons, and rocks and it is geologically very interesting. It is off the beaten path and you may not meet very many people. My daughter Anke, who studies geology in Germany, would really get a kick out of it and we hope she can visit the San Rafael Swell together with us soon.
We camped at the bottom of the Buckhorn Wash, a canyon that ends near the San Rafael River hanging bridge.
One of the best vistas in the San Rafael Swell is from the Wedge Overlook. From there you have a great view over the Grand Canyon of Utah. It is not as big as the Grand Canyon in Arizona but still quite impressive. Unfortunately we chose the "wrong" time to be there. Boring blue sky didn't deliver much dramatic for my landscape photography. But it was very clear and so I tried to work with the structure of the canyon, carved out by the San Rafael River since thousands of years. I can't be get really sad about weather issues. I have enjoyed being there despite the clean sky.
What difference clouds can make shows the next image. It was taken the same day from our campsite, just minutes before sunset. It has all the dramatic I was hoping for earlier in the day. Wonderful final of a great day...