Loose in the Palouse: Steptoe To Falls

One thing was made quite clear by our photography workshop leader when he gave us an introductory briefing on the Palouse.

We would be making multiple trips to Steptoe Butte.

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The geology of the Palouse is interesting. While its base is volcanic basalt, what makes the Palouse unique are the undulating hills. The formation of these had nothing to do with volcanos.

Back in the ice age days, a huge glacial lake called Lake Missoula formed in western Montana. We’re talking extra big here; at its greatest extent, Lake Missoula’s depth exceeded 2,000 feet and may have held 600 cubic miles of water – as much as Lake Erie and Lake Ontario combined. The surface area covered over 3,000 square miles.

On its western edge, an ice dam blocked the flow of water into Idaho, south central Washington and northern Oregon.

Until it didn’t.

Between the tremendous mass of all that water, and the warming that came at the end of the ice age, the ice dam failed violently and all that pent up water created a cataclysmic flood. This carved up sections of Washington and created the Columbia Gorge, along with other areas of interest to geologists or geologically curious.

It also ground up a lot of rock, and created many tons of silt. A lot of the silt landed in eastern Washington and Idaho, but some made it all the way to the Willamette Valley in western Oregon. Home sweet home now, but I wouldn’t have wanted to be around when the flood hit.

At one point, geologists thought this was one big flood for the ages. More recently, evidence suggests that it happened multiple times. Once Lake Missoula emptied out, it was still cold enough to form another dam and back up more water. This flooding cycle may have happened as often as every 50-60 years until the ice age was done. It may have also spanned multiple ice ages across millions of years, with flooding to mark their ends. Evidence suggests as many as 40 floods may have occurred.

(Click on any picture for a larger view)

Have a look at these pictures. Do the rolling hills remind you of anything? Sand dunes, maybe? How about silt dunes? The silt even has a fancy name – Loess. It’s mostly created by wind erosion and glaciers grinding away at rock, with wind patterns shaping the dunes. All this mineral rich silt also makes for very fertile soil – great for farmers. It’s literally loess in the Palouse here.

But the best place to get an eyeful of all these loess dunes is Steptoe Butte, which rises several thousand feet above the surrounding area.

Steptoe isn’t a giant dune, it’s a quartzite island that somehow survived the Missoula Flood’s pounding. It also has a road that circles up, and places you can park on various sides. The best view isn’t necessarily the one from the top – sometimes it helps to be closer to your subject.

A telephoto lens can help extract little slices of goodness from all that bump and roll.

The late afternoon sun adds to the colors of spring, giving warmth. The shadows add texture and depth.

Even without the color, the contrasts of infrared B/W can emphasize the textures.

And the late afternoon can be a sign to the farmers that it’s time to hit the road, and raise their own loess in the Palouse.

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We spent four days in the Palouse. It wasn’t all Steptoe Butte and rolling hills.

Ok, there were still a lot of rolling hills. But depending on where we were, the dunes, which could be as much as 250 feet deep, were thin or missing entirely. This left nearly bare basalt behind – an area called the scablands. But this basalt, scoured out by the Missoula floods, wasn’t all sanatized boredom.

In the scablands, about 45 miles west of Colfax where we were based due to proximity to Steptoe, was one of the nicer waterfalls in the Pacific Northwest – Palouse Falls.

As our second day’s weather was on the overcast/rainy side, trying to milk Steptoe and the dunes for goodness had a lower chance of success. This was a great excuse to visit the falls on day two rather than the original day three plan. That’s the nature of nature, sometimes you have to reschedule.

As it turns out, waterfalls are easier to shoot on overcast days. You don’t get the bright reflections, blown out highlights, and dynamic range issues that sunny days introduce. It’s also easier to shoot long exposures.

Under normal circumstances, I rarely carry a tripod. I like to travel light. But waterfalls are almost always an exception. (So are photography workshops. Being without a tripod at one of those is almost like being naked in public.) Because of the overcast, and with the help of ND filters (strong, color neutral sunglasses for camera lenses), with a tripod I can slow the shutter way down. The shots above were all about 30 seconds – ergo the misty/flowy look.

Shooting faster is a whole different look. But not necessary a bad one.

As workshop days go, the second was pretty low key. A morning photo review. A bit of cruising. A nice falls. Diner in Pulman – a college town. And a not too late night, which is a good thing. The next morning started with a really early Steptoe call…

But that’s a story for another day. For now, we’ll sign off with a sunset from Steptoe on day one.

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