What Is Mono Lake And Where Is It?
Mono Lake is a decent sized lake that covers about 65 square miles in the Eastern Sierra Mountain range of California. It is close to the town of Lee Vining. The largest town around is that of Mammoth Lakes (home to Mammoth Mountain ski area). It’s fairly close to the Tioga Pass Entrance to Yosemite National Park as well. If you are going to Mammoth Mountain or Yosemite, Mono Lake is definitely worth a stop, especially at sunset.
Mono Lake has no outlet and is one of the oldest lakes in North America. The streams that feed and fill Mono Lake carry salt and minerals down into the lake. Since there is no drainage out of Mono Lake, those salts and minerals remain in the lake. The water is very alkaline and is about 2.5X the salinity of the ocean.
Mono Lake is a popular spot for birds to feed and rest. It is estimated that anywhere up to two million birds use the habitat at Mono Lake during the year.
One of, if not the major attraction to Mono Lake (for photographers, anyway) is the calcium carbonate “tufa” towers around the lake. When freshwater mixes with alkaline water and interact, it slowly brings to life the famous “tufa” towers. The reserve was created to protect these unique “tufa” towers.
What Is It Like To Visit Mono Lake?
Traveling to Mono Lake is relatively straight forward. If you are in the Mammoth Lakes, June Lake or Yosemite area, Mono Lake is very easy to add on to your trip. If you are flying in, the Mammoth Lakes airport is the closest airport. From the town of Mammoth Lakes, the Mono Lake South Tufa Area is about a 40 minute drive and arguably the best place to begin your photo adventures at Mono Lake. It is an easy drive on good roads. Once you park there, you’ll have about a half mile hike up to a concentration of “tufa” towers. There is a $3.00 fee to go to the South Tufa area. The “America The Beautiful Pass” (aka The National Parks Annual Pass) and/or a California State Parks Pass MAY cover the entry fees if you have one of those.
Once you get there and take care of the $3.00 fee, there is a decent sized parking lot. There is a path down to the “tufa” area and it is a stunning place to see and explore. It’s an awesome place to photography anytime but especially if you get a really awesome sunset!
What Does It Take To Get A Wall Art Quality Mono Lake Sunset Photo?
Thanks to the calcium carbonate “tufa towers”, Mono Lake is an other worldly sight to see for most people. Most any photo there can make an awesome wall art print or impress your friends on Facebook.
The best and most popular place to photograph Mono Lake is definitely at the South Lake Tufa are. It is well worth the $3.00 charge to go there! If you’ve never seen anything like it before, you’ll be in awe and any photo you take there will be impressive. Like most other shots that involve water and mountains or other formations around the water, calm winds are great for getting reflections in your shorts. Watch the weather and look for calm winds so you can get reflection shots!
Mono Lake is definitely a sunset spot. In addition to watching the weather forecast for calm winds, look for light to moderate cloud cover at sunset. Clear nights can make for decent shots but if you can catch Mono Lake on a calm night and the skies catch fire, the results can be incredible when combined with the wild “tufa” landscape. The compositions are endless. The crowds back in 2011 were fairly light but as more people now venture outside to places like this, crowds may be significant at Mono Lake and make it difficult to get photos without people in them.
What Is The Best Gear For Photographing Sunset At Mono Lake?
Any camera you have will capture some of the the glory of Mono Lake at sunset or any other time. A cel phone will get cool shots to post on social media. A DSLR or mirrorless camera with a lens anywhere between 17mm and 100mm or so will provide the opportunity to frame up a wide variety of shots around the “tufas”. The landscape around Mono Lake is vast. If you have an panoramic setup or a camera that will do in camera panoramic shots, you’ll find that useful but not necessary at Mono Lake. A circular polarizer may come in handy at times as well.
In addition to the “tufas”, lots of birds visit or call Mono Lake home; anywhere up to 2 million per year. If you’ve got a long wildlife lens in the 400mm to 800mm range you may want to bring that along to get some cool bird shots. The Audubon Society has some information about birds at Mono Lake. The last time I went to Mono Lake I wasn’t particularly into bird photography. Most of what I noticed were seagulls and some small not particularly colorful or interesting birds so I didn’t break out any large lenses or try photographing the birds there.
What Is The Story Behind This Mono Lake Tufa Sunset Wall Art Photo Print?
I first hit the road for an extended road trip in 2010. It was going to be a two month trip to ski Snowbird in the spring. Once Snowbird closed for the season I was going to head back to Philly, find another computer screen in a cubicle and go back to living my comfortable but mundane life.
When I saw Mammoth Mountain was going to keep the sloes open every day until July 4th, I was drawn to Mammoth Mountain and got a short term rental apartment at a place called Royal Pines and plopped down for a couple months. Once the slopes closed I stuck around to explore the surrounding area. Mono Lake was one of those places.
Once I discovered Mono Lake, I went back repeatedly at sunset. I’d look at the weather forecast. I’d look for calm winds and some cloud cover. Then I’d look at the outrageous price of gas in Mammoth Lakes and decide if it was worth driving down to Mono Lake for sunset yet again. Most of the time it was if the wind and cloud forecast was favorable. Even when calm winds were predicted, they were still hard to come by. It doesn’t take much wind to stir up the waters at Mono Lake to mess up the reflections.
On this particular night, EVERYTHING came together. The winds stayed almost perfectly calm as the sun dropped below the horizon. The skies absolutely caught fire and turned fiery orange and red. A fiery flame appeared to shoot up out of the tufas as the sun dropped behind the mountains way off in the distance.
Once, the sun went down, I hiked back to the car in the dark. My feet were soaked from the swampy wet sand along the edge of the lake. Once back at the Royal Pines apartment, I was delighted with sunset shots from Mono Lake!
In What Formats Is The Mono Lake Tufas Sunset Wall Art Print Available?
This Mono Lake sunset photo wall art print is available on anything from matte paper and canvas print to shiny and reflective metal and acrylic prints. It also comes as a wood print. For any bright areas of the home or office with lots of bright lighting or natural light a matte finish would be ideal. In areas with more diffused lighting something more shiny and reflective like a metallic paper print, an actual metal print or an acrylic print would make nice choices.
If you are more interested in home decor, then a Sherpa fleece blanket, shower curtain or towel set may be more desirable. This image can look nice on a phone case though it will be somewhat cropped. Mono Lake sunset canvas tote bags look pretty sweet too.
For those who love jigsaw puzzles, a 1,000 piece puzzle would make a nice challenge with a beautiful reward once the puzzle is complete.
This photo won a monthly award from the California State Parks association. It was featured in the state parks calendar and used on some promotional materials way back in 2011 or 2012.
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