At the beginning of October, David Cobb and I were returning from a productive ten day photo trip in Montana and Idaho. We decided to detour slightly for a final stop at Palouse Falls in eastern Washington. We took a 30 minute stop for lunch in Baker City, Oregon which caused us to miss the sunset at the falls. We arrived at the falls about 30 minutes after sunset thinking that we had missed our window. However, the final glow on the horizon before the scene went totally dark was amazing. The orange post sunset glow in the sky reflected nicely off the cliff walls creating a moody, alien scene.

Palouse Falls drops over 150 feet into the deep and winding Palouse River Canyon in eastern Washington. The landscape in this area, not far from the Snake River Canyon, was carved by the massive Misoula Floods created when an enourmous ice dam broke in Montana at the end of the last ice age. Taking this photo required positioning my tripod legs right on the edge of the 370 foot high canyon rim and fighting back sensations of vertigo while standing on tip toe to see through the viewfinder.

Canon 5D, 16-35mm f/2.8 L lens, circular polarizer, 3 stop GND, 30 seconds @ f/13