Road Trip Out West; Exploring, Wandering and Photography; Part XII; Monument Valley

Left Mitten.  This was made to too long before sunset.  (Click any image to enlarge)
All images made with an OM-1 Mark II; 12-100mm f/4 PRO lens except as noted

Monument Valley.  What can I say?  I think everyone has seen photographs of Monument Valley or have viewed scenes of it in movies.  It is an iconic western U.S. landscape.

My wife and I visited Monument Valley once before, in 1996, but for only a couple of hours.  We traveled to Phoenix for me to attend a professional conference and afterward drove to the Grand Canyon to spend a few days in the Bright Angel Lodge.  That was our first time to the Grand Canyon.  On one of those days, we decided to visit Monument Valley.  While there we drove the loop road in our rental SUV.  I made a few photographs as we traversed the rocky, dusty and very bumpy landscape (I would never take my personal vehicle into the valley—just sayin’).  

The iconic view of Monument Valley at sunset.  One ‘has’ to make a photo of this or your
visit just won’t feel complete.  Iconic or not, I like this composition.

At the time I was shooting Kodachrome 64 slide film with a film Nikon, either a Nikon F2a or an N90s.  It probably was the F2a since the N90s needed batteries to function.  I was unable to bring my usual kit—my ginormous Pentax 6X7.  It wasn’t until 1997 that I switched over to shooting with a Leica M6 for my 35mm photography.  But I digress.

While at Monument Valley, we basically drove the 17 mile loop road, left and drove back to the Grand Canyon.  That was all the time we had.  We were traveling with another couple and the agendas were mixed so we had to take into account their wishes.  But we got to see it, albeit briefly.  This year it was time to return.

This time, I signed us up for one of the tours.  Monument Valley, often thought of as a national park or national monument, is actually on Navajo tribal land.  They control it and have done a good job of preserving its integrity.  Some, but not too much commercialization and pretty much naturally intact.  I chose a Navajo guided ‘sunset’ tour.  I chose this tour as a matter of timing.  Timing as to when we would arrive from Page, Arizona and timing to be in position to capture that warm evening light.  This turned out to be a great choice.  Without a tour, you are restricted as to where you can go.

This was made from “John Ford Point.”  John Ford was the director of many of the famous
western themed movies starring John Wayne and other famous actors of that time.  There is a 
Scene in the 1956 move The Searchers where John Wayne is sitting on a horse looking toward
these buttes from my exact position.

Our Navajo guide took our small group of 7 to several places where the general public was not permitted to go.  We visited several of their spiritual sites as well as visiting a Navajo woman in an authentic hogan, the traditional Navajo dwelling, who gave a presentation on making thread and fabric from sheep’s wool as well as several other cultural craft examples.  Couple that with the insight and information given to us by our guide and our three hour trip was very satisfying.  I would recommend taking a tour if you go.  At the very least you won’t ruin the suspension and undercarriage of your vehicle by driving it on the loop road.  I’m not exaggerating.

This huge eroded cave-like formation with a hole in the top is one of the places our guide took us. 
The photo below is from the inside looking up and back out.  Very interesting.

Do you see the eagle?  The opening is the eye and the darkened rock on the left forms the eagle's
beak.  This is a very spiritual place to the Navajo.  Without a guided tour, you don't get to see things
like this.

When making arrangements to visit Monument Valley, I decided for us to have the full experience.  That meant I booked a room at The View Hotel, which is part of the visitor’s center, shops and restaurant complex.  The hotel is right on the edge of the valley and all rooms face the valley.  If you arise early enough, you can see sunrise from your balcony.  Spectacular.  The View Hotel and associated other venues weren’t built until 2008 so the place looked a lot different from my last visit.

This was the view from our hotel room.  On the left is the patio area outside the hotel lobby
with an adjacent gift shop and restaurant.  None of this was here the last time we visited.
This image was made with my Fujifilm X100VI (from a JPEG file)

In fact, the next morning I arose well before dawn, dressed and left the room for sunrise.  I didn’t even wake up my wife!  The day before I had utilized PhotoPills to see exactly where the sun would rise using the virtual reality function, then scoped out a place nearby where the would sun rise exactly where I wanted it in my envisioned photograph.  I did get exactly what I envisioned as you can see in this post.

Sunrise, Monument Valley.  I’ve edited this image with (as shown above) and without the 
roadway in the foreground (below).  I prefer without the roadway showing.

Which version do you prefer?

Sunrise, Left Mitten.  Again, I’ve edited out the roadway in the version below, which I prefer.
Which of these versions do you prefer?  Is editing out the roadway being dishonest?

Here are a couple more images for your viewing pleasure!

If you look closely, you can see a white truck on the roadway in the lower center of the photo.
That gives you an idea of the scale of these massive sandstone buttes and mesas.

After a decent breakfast in the hotel’s restaurant, we left and headed toward Flagstaff, where we planned to meet a relative of mine.  Flagstaff is one of those place in the United States that I could choose to live.  Not too large, nice weather, four seasons, low humidity, lots of good photography within 100 miles and a university culture.

Join me over at my website, https://www.dennismook.com.  

Thanks for looking. Enjoy!  

Dennis A. Mook  

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