This is a view of Mt Olympus from the High Divide, which runs across the Hoh River Valley from Olympus on the north side. The High Divide is one of the most popular hikes in the Olympic National Park … with views like this, there’s a good reason for it. (Reservations are required and are hard to get.)
From the top of Hurricane Hill, you can see just the top of Mt Olympus “peaking” above the Bailey Range (which runs down through the middle of Olympic National Park. I thought the dry grasses in the foreground made an interesting contrast.
I took this image a few years back while hiking around the High Divide, camping in a spot just off the trail. There wasn’t much water around (1/2 mile + away), but the view made up for it. The High Divide is the most popular backpack in the Olympic National Park … these days you need to make a reservation months in advance … and even then good luck getting one of the limited number.
Below is a view south from the High Divide trail about a mile or so from the camp above. Mt Olympus is the snowy peak on the left of center, Mt Tom is the snow peak just right of center. The Hoh River valley is between the trail and those peaks.
I enjoy taking my photographs and using them as a starting point for other art forms. I have done colored pencil images and line drawings, mostly. While experimenting with various tools in Photoshop, I found an Edge Detect tool that I like a lot. This image is a combination of Edge Detect and hand drawn edge enhancement (for instance, along the ridgelines). Below is the original image looking across the Hoh River valley to Mt Olympus from the High Divide trail … from a campsite on the eastern edge of the trail near Heart Lake. We had a spectacular sunset and a great sunrise to wake to.
