Driving, NJ - L.A. (Landscape photography)

[wallybud]

I will be driving cross country next year to L.A. and need recommendations on MUST SEE landscape opportunities...

only area work stopping/hiking/etc

All I know is i'll be in Arizona for quite a while ;)

You ladies and gents got anything for me:(?

[krb]

You must take the freeway from Denver to Salt Lake City. Even if you don't get off the main roads the vistas will be well worth it.

[CannedHeat]

Where will you destine in Cali, south, central, or north?

[wallybud]

haha I will be arriving in LA?

[engsetr1]

I will be driving cross country next year to L.A. and need recommendations on MUST SEE landscape opportunities...

Can I come! :) Have a great time! Sounds like a great experience, hope to be able to have enough time/money one day to be able to do something like that!

[wallybud]

haha if you wanna split room and gas and can fly home when we get there

Im moving there haha unfortunately, Ill have all my belongings with me so i'll have to be careful when leaving my car somewhere but instead of driving straight across Im thinking maybe 2 weeks give or take

I've driven from wyoming to NJ three times I believe, once by myself, nothing beats the open road:)

[zacker]

watch out for short cuts and un marked roads... and if your cell phone dies, gets broken/lost or has no signal... turn back at once.... it means there is a Psycho or family of Mutants waiting to tie you up and kill you.. I know, it happens all the time. someone takes a short cut, and things take a turn for the worse!

lol.. good luck on the trip, sound really cool..id love to do that but just sell everything and buy a camper and just drive and visit every state..

[wallybud]

haha! thanks man :)

[CannedHeat]

Well, I meant if you were driving up the cali coast after l.a.

Either way, depending upon how much fool-around time you have, I would recommend you get onto the old Route 66 in various spots, even if you have to drive a bit to reach a piece of it. It's an old, pictureesque historic road which offers incredible opportunities for old building, cars, and historic sites.

[wallybud]

Im more looking for the cracked dry ground with a single tree type of stuff, waterfalls (small/big same difference)...I have historic stuff in NJ to fiddle with, granted im sure 66 is awesome just not really what im looking for

[engsetr1]

I've driven from wyoming to NJ three times I believe, once by myself, nothing beats the open road

I'm headed to Wyoming soon! Flying though. Absolutly can't wait! Headed to Yellowstone/Tetons!

[tonylong]

You say you'll be spending time in Arizona -- it's mostly desert but also has some fantastic scenic spots. The Grand Canyon, of course, Flagstaff is nice, and the Oak Creek Canyon and the Sedona area are very scenic, and there is the Painted Desert and the Petrified Forest (although I don't know how much there would be to photograph there).

Colorado is in the heart of the Rocky Mountains, with towns like Ouray where you can reach out and touch a mountain. Southern Colorado also has some very scenic sites, such as the Delores River Valley and the Pueblo area. And then the whole Four Corners area has the Indian ruins, such as those in Mesa Verde, which are pretty scenic as well as fascinating.

Somebody mentioned a side trip up to Wyoming...you'd need to get up to someplace like Yellowstone to really get the scenery, 'cause southern Wyoming is pretty much a wasteland except for the hilly country around Cheyenne. But another side trip is into Utah. If you go from Denver into Utah you have the Colorado River, the Arches, and then in Utah you have places like Bryce Canyon and other quite remarkable places.

going from Arizona into Southern California is mostly flat driving with a few scenic possibilities: you can explore the Colorado River, you can go up into the Sierra Nevada mountains, but a very cool side trip is up into Joshua Tree National Monument, near Palm Springs, very cool stuff there. Also, the Palm Springs area has a wind tunnel that led to some of the early windmill turbines that can give some cool pics.

Of course, once you get into the LA area, you are surrounded by everything from the beach with surfers and more and urban photo opportunities, Hollywood, Universal, Disney, the works.

[wallybud]

I'm headed to Wyoming soon! Flying though. Absolutly can't wait! Headed to Yellowstone/Tetons!

You say you'll be spending time in Arizona -- it's mostly desert but also has some fantastic scenic spots. The Grand Canyon, of course, Flagstaff is nice, and the Oak Creek Canyon and the Sedona area are very scenic, and there is the Painted Desert and the Petrified Forest (although I don't know how much there would be to photograph there).

Colorado is in the heart of the Rocky Mountains, with towns like Ouray where you can reach out and touch a mountain. Southern Colorado also has some very scenic sites, such as the Delores River Valley and the Pueblo area. And then the whole Four Corners area has the Indian ruins, such as those in Mesa Verde, which are pretty scenic as well as fascinating.

Somebody mentioned a side trip up to Wyoming...you'd need to get up to someplace like Yellowstone to really get the scenery, 'cause southern Wyoming is pretty much a wasteland except for the hilly country around Cheyenne. But another side trip is into Utah. If you go from Denver into Utah you have the Colorado River, the Arches, and then in Utah you have places like Bryce Canyon and other quite remarkable places.

going from Arizona into Southern California is mostly flat driving with a few scenic possibilities: you can explore the Colorado River, you can go up into the Sierra Nevada mountains, but a very cool side trip is up into Joshua Tree National Monument, near Palm Springs, very cool stuff there. Also, the Palm Springs area has a wind tunnel that led to some of the early windmill turbines that can give some cool pics.

Of course, once you get into the LA area, you are surrounded by everything from the beach with surfers and more and urban photo opportunities, Hollywood, Universal, Disney, the works.

Awesome this is more of what I was looking for:)

Ill check all that out online and see what Id like to put on list...as for wyoming, I went to the University of WY located in laramie...some of the sickest off-roading i've seen, rock climbing is A+ (boulder climbing that is), all of this done at an altitude of 8600ft hahah, so you can easily hit 9000+ when off-roading....I don't recommend bringing more than 6 beers per person when at that altitude :rolleyes:

thanks again for the info!

[WahooWolfe]

Once you get to Denver, assuming you're on I 70, stop off at Hanging Lake near No Name, Colorado. It's just east of Glenwood Springs and has a wonderful hike up to the lake. Well worth the couple of hours you'll spend there.

Best wishes for great pictures!

[Tsmith]

You should venture up to Montana and drive across the Going to the Sun Road. An American marvel to behold.

[sparker1]

In Arizona, don't overlook Tucson for fields of saguaro cactus. Page is a great area, with Upper & Lower Antelope Canyons, Horseshoe Bend, Lake Powell and much, much more.

[FLphotoguy]

You can get off I40 in Kingman, AZ and take Route 66 through Oatman to Needles, CA. Oatman is an interesting place to visit and has some nice landscape to photograph.

[argyle]

Why leave NJ now? The recent gubernatorial election seemed to go really well... :lol:

I left 25 years ago...made the drive from NJ to Texas twice. No regrets...just a trip or two a year back to see the folks.

Sounds like a good road trip...personally, I could spend all of my time in Arizona/Utah. Good luck from a fellow NJ native.

[irishman]

My favorite place in all of AZ is Canyon de Chelly. You can do it and Monument Valley in a couple of days. They are an hour and a half apart. I'm local.