The mountains across the valley is the Bailey Range, which run down the center of the Olympic Mountains. The view is from Hurricane Ridge, where there is a visitor center over 5000 feet. The valley full of clouds is the Elwha River … one of the huge success stories in salmon restoration. Two dams that were erected in the early years of the 20th century, without the required salmon ladders, were removed which opened up miles of prime salmon habitat. There used to be 5 species of salmon plus steelhead that called the Elwha home, and some of those have returned … hopefully the rest will eventually follow.
Central Olympics
One can drive up to over 5000 feet to Hurricane Ridge in the Olympic National Park and the views are spectacular. I converted these to black and white partly because the mist/water vapor was heavy enough that there was a blue cast to the images that was difficult to remove. The Dehaze tool in Lightroom works pretty well until the hazy gets thick. Then in order to remove the overall blue cast, you have to make tonal adjustments that can turn the other colors in the image away from their normal tones. So I frequently just convert to black and white.
Besides, I like B&W.
Bailey Range from the East
This is the east side of the Bailey Range in Olympic National Park from the Hurricane Hill road.
There is an off-trail route along the other side. I have tried to hike that trail several times, but always got rained out … or ran out of time after searching for the route.
- Camera: Fujifilm GFX-50R
- Lens: Fujinon GF 120mm
- ISO 400 1/320 sec f/14
Hurricane Ridge Visitor Center in Winter
The Olympic National Park includes a road that runs up to Hurricane Ridge at an elevation of over 5000 feet. During the winter it is the only ski area on the Olympic Peninsula… it’s small but it attracts a lot of folks, even though there is only a rope tow and no actual lift. On days when there’s a view, it is spectacular. This view looks across the Elwha Valley to the central Bailey Range.
I had been shooting with my zoom lens out to 400mm … and had the ISO and shutter speed set for that lens. When I changed the lens back to the wide angle zoom, I forgot to readjust the settings until after I had shot this.
Camera: Nikon D850 Lens: 28-85 mm set at 52mm ISO 400 1/1000 sec f/16
Bailey Range Ridge Detail
This is a detail of the central Bailey Range (Olympic National Park) I took from Hurricane Ridge while snowshoeing. This is a section just south of Mt Carrie.
Camera: Nikon D850 Lens: Nikkor 28-300mm set at 300mm ISO 200 1/1000 sec f/11