Visiting & Photographing Cedar Breaks National Monument
- markhoude
- Oct 21
- 2 min read
Cedar Breaks moved me spiritually, and hinted at something special, but I wasn't quite sure what it was until I stood at the base of an Ancient Great Basin Bristlecone Pine. Palming my hand over its textured and weathered wood was quite extraordinary. This sounds silly, does it not? And yet, such a simple touch gave me an unforgettable experience.
Why, you ask? Because I was standing in the presence of one of the world's oldest living tree species. I tried to imagine what 1,600 years of survival is like. 1,600+ years ago, when this tree was just a seed, the fall of the Western Roman Empire was in decline.
At over 10,000 feet above sea level, out on the edge of a rim of an amphitheater some 2,000 feet below and 3 miles wide, the weather here is fierce, and the winters are brutal. I tried to imagine a mega Time-lapse through time, from seed to sapling and beyond, of what this tree has endured... 584,000 sunrises & sunsets, storms, fires, insects, animals, sparse nutrients, and more, it was quite humbling to be in the presence of this ancient tree, and boy, was it beautiful.
John Muir said it like this:
... this tree is ever found
to be irrepressibly and extravagantly
picturesque, offering a richer and
more varied series of forms to the
artist than any other species
I have yet seen.”
The character and shape of this Bristlecone was absolutely stunning. I photographed it from every side, and there was a strong desire from all 3 of us to have our photo taken with this gentle giant. I rarely include myself in my landscape images, but I made an exception for this gallery, if nothing else, but to show scale and perspective.
Cedar Breaks was well worth the stop; it took a day from us that we could have spent in Zion, and yet, it was so worth the time, and we would have missed something special from this trip had we not gone.
From the visitor center, it's a 1-mile hike along the rim to reach Spectra Point, and then 1 mile back. Pack a light kit and bring your trekking poles. If you're not acclimated to the altitude, you may find this hike challenging.
I suggest taking your telephoto shots at the visitor center (Point Supreme Viewpoint), there are excellent shots to make of the hoodoos and amphitheater, but then leaving the long lens in your vehicle to save weight along the hike, you won't need it for the Bristlecone.
I was glad to have created some fantastic black and white imagery of this wonderful tree. The light and clouds lent themselves nearly perfectly for B&W work. But ultimately, it was the experience of meeting this beauty, which was a blink of an eye for the tree, and a lifetime of memories for me.
- The Houdsta
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