Nicole Vaunt at Fossil Falls (Patreon)

We drove late into the night from LA through the Sierra Nevada's and to the Coso Mountain Range finally getting to our campsite at 1am.  The campground for Fossil Falls looked like one of America's least used.  Nothing to really signify that there was a place for your tent other than a small rusted out fire ring, and a picnic table.  We thought about setting up camp in the middle of the parking lot for the trail head just to be safe thinking that we probably weren't going to see a Park Ranger way out there in the middle of nowhere, but decided the half mile hike  was something we could manage in the morning, and if someone did come early it'd be safer to sleep off road.

Three and a half hours later Nicole and I were up with the sun.  Shooting on cloudless days is not my favorite thing, but being up early enough is fine when you are hiking into a canyon that will give you some nice shade to hide in.

The geology of Fossil Falls is like nothing I have ever seen before.  Formed by the interaction of a volcano and a river that flowed from glacial rivers that once ran from the near by Sierra's, the beautiful rock formations were formed and smoothed from 400,000-10,000 years ago.

We climbed deep into the canyon to escape the direct sun.  From the desert surface the falls run down about 5 stories.  I switched between shooting with the 17-40mm F4 L for the wider shots, and the Sigma 85mm F1.4 for the closer up ones.  Since we were the only ones in the park that night we shot until about 8:30 when sun was too high in the sky for us to keeping taking photos we were happy with.  

This spot has been on my list for outdoor nudes for a little over a year now, and I'm so glad we managed to make it happen on this trip.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/r96fh3fb7dpz2hr/AACKHVLGPj6lNWwQtOu589Wba?dl=0