Golden California Sunrise

The beautiful Los Angeles skyline and the Griffith Observatory in the foreground enveloped by a never-ending Golden Californian Sunrise.

--... more

by Az Jackson

Title

Golden California Sunrise

Artist

Az Jackson

Medium

Photograph

Description

The beautiful Los Angeles skyline and the Griffith Observatory in the foreground enveloped by a never-ending Golden Californian Sunrise.

-- Artists Notes --
Funny story... I was standing at the bottom of Mt Lee after driving as far as I could go up to the Hollywood sign. It was just before daybreak and I wanted to be up at the top all set up and ready in time for the sunrise. Being so dark and totally new territory for me I thought the best way to get to the top is to go straight up so that's what I did.

I started my ascension and after about 10 minutes I thought "This is ok... I haven't gone far but I'm sure I'll be there in 20 minutes or so", so I persevered. 20 minutes goes by and I hadn't made much ground as the soil is very loose on the mountain, much like the soil of the Grand Canyon. By this time I'm sweating and heaving with a full back pack, tripod and gear and the sun is less than 10 minutes away from appearing.

Ok, now I'm starting to panic a bit so I double time and try to climb faster until finally the sun started appearing and I was only half way up. I stopped to catch my breath and with sweat pouring off my brow and knowing that this was the only sunrise I was going to see in LA, in that moment I felt defeated by the mountain.

But, chin up, I decided to set up on a small ledge anyway to see what I could capture. My focus was solely on getting shots of the Hollywood Sign so I was facing the mountain the whole time and I turn around and to my amazement this beautiful scene in front of me appeared and I was able to catch my breath, take my time and capture a bunch of shots.

That's when I noticed a couple of joggers casually running up the hill to the top of the Hollywood Sign which made me chuckle because here I was thinking that I had to climb the side of the mountain to get the best view when all I had to do was follow the windy road straight up to the top.

On this day I was blessed as the golden hues in the sky lasting for a couple of hours so I was able to capture this amazing view along with a couple of my other special pieces like 'High On Hollywood' and 'LA LA Land'.

Sometimes the journey is the destination, especially when it comes to taking pictures.

Uploaded

April 3rd, 2015

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