516 - Hidden Valley
It was only a matter of time before I ran into some goons making a sketchy deal in the middle of the desert.
This tale begins in good ole’ southern Cali. I decided to drive down for the New Year, as I got a gig shooting photography at some circus themed party in the desert. More on that later…
In the meantime, I had a few days before the event. And since I’ve been shooting rather sporadically the past couple of months, I figured I could use a warm up.
So I decided what better place to visit than an old, abandoned, concrete mill?
The place was located on the outskirts of Palm Springs, near some housing development that looked vaguely sketchy. Google Maps pointed me through the neighborhood, which I found odd- most factories are in industrial areas, not suburban neighborhoods. But OK, I’ll play along.
I kept driving. Suddenly I passed a rehab facility that was in the middle of the suburbia. Next to it was a dirt road that led into the mountains. I guess this wasn’t so much of a suburbia after all. I turned onto the path and flipped on my air recirculation.
After about a minute of driving, an off-color low-rider pickup truck suddenly passed me. Two dudes sat in the front seat and gave me a hard look. It was some combination of surprise and eyeing me down. I couldn’t place my finger on it, but it felt off.
I proceeded down the road, my senses a little stimulated. About a minute later, I arrived at the factory. As I drove around looking for a place to park, I took in the scene.
Graffiti, broken walls, shoes hanging the powerlines, and old industrial equipment. Broken glass everywhere. This was gonna be an awesome place to shoot. As long as those dudes didn’t come back.
I rounded the corner to the final building, and I saw a black glisten in the edge of my vision. Standing out like a sore thumb against the dilapidated building, was a clean black cadillac. It was clearly parked in a position to hide itself from view of the road. My eyes fell upon the driver. He locked eyes with me, clearly wondering what the fuck I was doing there.
I put the pieces together. I was two hours from the border at an abandoned factory in the desert. These dude’s weren’t on an “adventure.” For a single, psychotic second, I considered shooting the area anyway. Then I snapped back to reality. I swiveled my car and jetted out.
Fuck. Those kinds of places are a dime a dozen. I drove away, feeling defeated. I pulled into the rehab parking lot. I wanted to make sure this dude wasn’t coming after me. In the meantime, what else was around here?
There was Joshua Tree National Park... A little bit of a drive, but I had time. It was an overcast day, so I was starting early. I flipped through some travel blogs and decided I’d check out an area in the park called Hidden Valley.
I took one last look down the dirt road and figured I was good to go. Not trying to get shot by the cartel today. My mood began to heighten as a new adventure was on course.
…and then I arrived at Joshua Tree, about an hour later. There was a massive line of cars. It took me a moment to realize that New Years was in two days. Right… The holiday season…
Sunset was slowly edging closer, as I’d now already driven an hour to get here. This better work out. I blasted J. Cole, counting down the minutes. I felt like a bull at the gate ready to run.
Finally, I arrived at the entrance. They decided to stop asking for people to pay on the way in because the crowds were too insane. I booked it down the winding roads to Hidden Valley, taking in all the prickly cacti. My mind was flooded with memories from this place a year ago.
As soon as I arrived at the parking lot I ran out of the car and booked it straight into the desert. No trail, no path, no nothing. I wanted to be alone with the cacti.
The sun was looking iffy. The clouds were dense, and I couldn’t tell what was going to happen. I started scrambling for a composition, and suddenly began to remember how difficult it is to shoot tall cacti.
Unless you’re going for a silhouette, isolating a subject can be difficult- especially when you’re at ground level with them. I kept moving forward. I tried a rock wall, a double joshua tree, and some flowers. Couldn’t get anything to work. Ahhhhhhhhhh!!
Then I saw it. The perfect rock. It had a small pool of water in it, and the curves of a goddess. In the last possible second before sunset, I snagged this pic:
“Hole in One”
Taken with Sony a7rIII + Tamron 17-28mm f/2.8
[ISO 320 ~ 17mm ~ f/8 ~ 1/160s]
(Want a Print? Get one here.)
What a beauty.
In my next shoot, I get my first taste of the real LA at a party in the middle of Nowhere.
Peaceeeeeeee.
I’m on a mission to explore as much as humanely possible.
Want to see my progress? Check out the Adventure Map.
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