Fun fact: a group of ravens is known as an “unkindness.”

This dead tree clawing the sky seemed to me a stark reminder of what it means to live in the desert.

Most photographers know it’s hard to capture the scale of the Grand Canyon, but it’s also incredibly difficult to convey the seemingly endless layers of light and shadow in the canyons too.

The Navajo name for Upper Antelope Canyon is Tsé bighánílíní, which means 'the place where water runs through rocks'.

The magical colors of the Navajo Sandstone are a result of minerals (i.e. hematite, goethite, and limonite) deposited in the quartz sand walls over the course of 190 million years.

I was awestruck here, in love with the otherworldly colors and shapes of these walls. These canyons are truly magical, and a testament to the power of nature.

The mighty Colorado once flowed where it wanted. And a meandering river, with its dramatic incisions, is a beautiful thing.

As droughts become longer and more frequent due to climate change, young Joshua Trees at lower altitudes are dying off. By the end of the century, the Joshua tree population could shrink to just one tenth of its current size.

A California condor’s 9 ft wingspan helps it soar for hours, at speeds up to 55 mph, as it searches for carrion. These massive birds can weight up to 26 lbs and live for 60 years.

Most causes of condor death in the past 200 years have been due to human activities, leading to the bird’s near extinction. The last wild condor was captured in 1987; all 27 birds were kept at breeding facilities in LA and San Diego. As of 2016, the condor population reached 446 birds.

The call of the void

President Taft originally named the area Mukuntuweap National Monument, but in 1918, the acting director of the NPS, Horace Albright, suggested renaming it Zion national Monument. Many believed that Spanish and Indigenous names would deter visitors, who wouldn’t come to a place whose name they couldn’t pronounce.