Kevin Palmer

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  • Cathedral Rock is locatred halfway up Bunsen Peak in Yellowstone National Park. Mammoth Hot Springs can be seen in the distance.
    Cathedral Rock
  • This bridge crosses a canyon over the Gardiner River. On the upper left steam can be seen rising from the Mammoth Hot Springs geothermal features.
    Bridge Over Gardiner River
  • At the end of February I went camping at Mammoth Hot Springs, the only campground in Yellowstone that stays open for the winter. With constant snow coming down, it was hard to get out of my tent in the morning. But as the sun started to climb over Mount Everts, I knew something special was about to happen. I climbed the hill across from the campground to watch this 22 degree halo appear. The sun was too bright to include in the photo so I used this tree to block it out.
    Mammoth Halo
  • The Orange Spring Mound is one of the more colorful geothermal features found in the Mammoth Hot Springs area.
    Orange Spring in Winter
  • This magpie was very bold as I was packing up my tent at the Mammoth Hot Springs Campground. It was looking for any food I may have dropped under the picnic table.
    Magpie in Tree
  • The Grand Prismatic Spring is 370 feet around making it the biggest hot spring in the US. The microbial mats give the spring it's intense colors.
    Grand Prismatic Spring
  • On an overcast day, the sun came out for a minute over the Abyss Pool in Yellowstone National Park. Located in the West Thumb Geyser Basin, the turquoise pool is 53 feet deep.
    Sunshine in the Abyss
  • Old Faithful Geyser erupts on a September morning.
    Late Morning Eruption
  • The temperature topped 100°F as I drove down a dirt road called the Calypso Trail. The terrain of eastern Montana may appear boring at first. But the Terry Badlands area is filled with all kinds of geological wonders including toadstools, pillars, caves, and these natural bridges. I couldn't find much information on this place and getting here wasn't easy. Washouts, sand, and sinkholes make the road in very rough. Any rain will turn it to mud and make it impassable. Once at the end it's only a couple mile hike through fields of biting flies. I didn't even know there would be 3 natural bridges until I arrived. It was tricky to get all of them in one picture until I went underneath. Just past the bridges was a strange tunnel carved by water, with the roof collapsed in places. Some of the only shade in the area is found by standing underneath the bridges which are up to 50 feet long. This is a dry, desolate place, but still it has a certain beauty to it.
    All 3 Natural Bridges
  • This is Bright Angel Creek at the bottom of the Grand Canyon next to Phantom Ranch.
    Bright Angel Creek
  • By the time I finished hiking the Upper Terrace loop trail the snow was coming down heavily.
    Upper Terrace Trail
  • This beach is a popular stop for rafting trips through the Grand Canyon since it's next to Phantom Ranch.
    Beached Rafts
  • Old Faithful in Yellowstone National Park erupts under the light of a full moon. It is the most predictable geographical feature on Earth with eruptions about every 91 minutes. Even though it is one of the most popular sights in the park, there were very few people out to see it at 10pm.  Partially hidden behind the top of the plume, you can see the Big Dipper, or 'Ursa Major' constellation.
    Old Faithful Moonlight
  • Most of the ice at Piney Creek was covered by a layer of snow. But this portion of the creek was different, and the ice had a beautiful turquoise color. For some reason the water was flowing on top of the ice here. It almost looked like a hot spring was melting the ice in this spot and surging up over the ice. But there are no hot springs in the Bighorn Mountains.
    Water On Top of Ice
  • I can't say I miss the very humid days and nights of Illinois. But I do miss the fireflies. Their flashing lights are nowhere to be found in drier areas out west. Fireflies (also called lightning bugs) thrive in hot and humid weather. They are typically most active in the late spring and early summer. They flash their lights in the evening before quieting down when the temperature drops. I recently spent a few hours at Spring Lake, which is a place I've gone stargazing many times. This firefly entered the frame near Mars which stood out prominently as the red planet. Mars gets slightly brighter every night until it reaches opposition at the end of July, at which point it will be the brightest it's been in 15 years. Saturn is also visible, just right of center in a star cloud of the milky way. I was a little disappointed when a breeze came up and ruined the reflection, but it did provide relief from the biting mosquitoes.
    Galactic Firefly
  • The colors of sunset linger behind Bearhat Mountain in Glacier National Park. The beautiful Hidden Lake wraps around the base of the mountain, before the creek drops to the valley below. Normally there is more snow in this view, but most of it had melted after a hot summer. The distant Gunsight Mountain and Sperry Glacier can be seen on the left.
    Hidden Lake View
  • A supercell lurked in the darkness. Every few seconds a flash would illuminate the thundercloud and show a silhouette of the sharp spires of the Badlands. This was the 4th storm I watched this evening. Rumbles of thunder slowly grew louder as yet another storm approached from the west and threatened to block the view of this one. Badlands National Park is one of my favorite places to capture storms. Even when they’re 100 miles away, the views here are excellent. And distant storms are preferred when I’m camping. The Badlands are very exposed to the elements. There is no escaping the rain, wind, and mud. An earlier downpour soaked me to the skin but the wind that followed dried me in minutes. The mud is the type that cakes to the bottom of your shoes making every footstep heavier. But a few hours in the hot sun and the mud is baked dry. At the time of this picture tennis-ball sized hail was reported in the Pine Ridge Reservation to the south. The lights are from the metropolis of Interior, population 94. The lightning was mostly cloud-to-cloud; this was the only strike I captured out of 500 shots.
    Strike Beyond Interior
  • Iceland has no shortage of scenic waterfalls. This one is called Hraunfossar (meaning Lava Falls) and it's located near Húsafell in the western interior. The water splits into numerous cascades as it trickles through the mossy lava field and flows into the Hvítá River. Volcanic activity still heats the many hot springs found in this valley, which includes the most powerful one in Europe. The river is fed by the Langjökull Glacier, the 2nd largest in Iceland. Glacial silt suspended in the water gives it the beautiful turquoise color. A forest of short but colorful birch trees grew around the river, an unusual sight in this mostly treeless country.
    Hraunfossar
  • The colors of sunset linger behind Bearhat Mountain in Glacier National Park. The beautiful Hidden Lake wraps around the base of the mountain, before the creek drops to the valley below. Normally there is more snow in this view, but most of it had melted after a hot summer. The distant Gunsight Mountain and Sperry Glacier can be seen on the left.
    Bearhat Mountain
  • It was nearly 11pm in southern Saskatchewan. I had just watched a bright auroral substorm send colorful arcs high into the northern sky, but it was starting to fade. Then I turned around, looking south, and this is what I saw. A bright pinkish strip of light stretched from east to west, while the crescent moon hung low on the horizon. It's one of the most unusual things I've ever seen in the night sky. This strange type of aurora is called Steve. The name started as a joke, but it stuck.  Steve was first captured last year by a group of aurora photographers in Alberta. After ESA flew a satellite through it earlier this year, it was discovered that it's comprised of very hot (10,800°F) ionized gases moving along at 4 miles per second. This ribbon of light is 16 miles wide and thousands of miles long. I watched as Steve started overhead nearly paralleling the US-Canada border, before slowly moving south. It turned into a green "picket fence" pattern before fading away. It was awesome to see such a mysterious phenomena which is still being studied by scientists.
    An Aurora Named Steve
  • I got an early start climbing Coyote Mountain in Anza Borrego Desert State Park. It was going to be a very hot day, but the temperature was much more pleasant in the morning. The just past full moon set in the west while I climbed a ridge in between 2 canyons.
    Coyote Mountain Bloom
  • It was a very hot summer day in Illinois with oppressive humidity and extremely unstable air. At 5PM this storm exploded into existence near Utica and in less than an hour it was dropping 4" hail. After leaving the storm to cross the Illinois River and avoid getting caught in the hail, I met back up with it here. The supercell was showing some of the best structure I've seen with an obvious spiral shape. The clear slot caused by the rear flank downdraft made it easy to pinpoint where a potential tornado would form. A likely funnel cloud can be seen just above the distant group of trees. But even though conditions in the upper atmosphere were more than enough to support a tornado, the winds at the surface were too weak. I followed the supercell for most of it's life cycle but nothing ever touched down.
    Red Barn Supercell
  • Reynolds Mountain glows from the last light of the day in Glacier National Park, Montana. This small pond can be found above Logan Pass, along the Hidden Lake trail. There was not much snow remaining on the peaks after a long hot summer.
    Reynolds Mountain
  • Fueled by hot, dry weather and gusty winds, it only took a day and a half for the Apple Fire to explode to 32 square miles. As the forest went up in flames, the plume of smoke ballooned to 25,000 feet. That's more than twice the height of San Gorgonio Mountain, Southern California's highest peak seen in the middle of this photo. The behavior of this fire is extreme enough to make it's own weather. Pyrocumulus is a type of cloud formed when intense heat creates an updraft similar to a thunderstorm. Pyrocumulus lofts embers high into the air, creates strong unpredictable outflow winds at the surface, and in rare cases even generates lightning. The same phenomena is seen in volcanic eruptions. All of this hampers firefighting efforts and causes the flames to expand even more. But even in the devastation, there was beauty. From my vantage point northwest of the blaze, the smoke plume took on a deep red glow at sunset before the 97% full moon rose above it.
    Pyrocumulus Moon
  • In the northwest corner of Washington state is one of the wettest places in the US. Up to 10 feet of rain falls here annually, which creates a lush rain forest. The dense canopy blocks out the sun, and the forest floor is covered with moss and ferns. When the massive trees do fall, many of the logs end up in rivers and are carried out to sea, where they become piled up along the beaches. Marymere Falls is a 90 foot high waterfall found not far from the shore of Lake Crescent in Olympic National Park. This hot August day was the perfect time to photograph the rain forest, since thick wildfire smoke was blocking out all of the big views.
    Falls and Ferns
  • Iceland has no shortage of scenic waterfalls. This one is called Hraunfossar (meaning Lava Falls) and it's located near Húsafell in the western interior. The water splits into numerous cascades as it trickles through the mossy lava field and flows into the Hvítá River. Volcanic activity still heats the many hot springs found in this valley, which includes the most powerful one in Europe. The river is fed by the Langjökull Glacier, the 2nd largest in Iceland. Glacial silt suspended in the water gives it the beautiful turquoise color. A forest of short but colorful birch trees grew around the river, an unusual sight in this mostly treeless country.
    Lava Falls
  • The solar eclipse was absolutely incredible. There's no way to capture it in 1 picture or 1,000 pictures and there's nothing really to compare it to. During the minutes surrounding totality the light changed so fast and there was so much to observe and photograph that it was overwhelming. It felt like time stood still and yet it was all over in an instant. I listened to the dozens of people around me who also climbed the 10,276' Laramie Peak to observe this eclipse. Cheering and exclamations of "WOW" were an almost involuntary reaction.<br />
<br />
This is a composite showing 3 partial phases of the eclipse with a solar filter, as well as 3 of the features that are visible during totality. A group of sunspots was visible before being hidden by the moon. The red fringes on the left are solar prominences. Bigger than any planet, prominences are made up of dynamic loops of hot plasma and will often explode. This outer atmosphere of the sun is sculpted by it's magnetic field. The temperature of the corona is up to 450 times hotter than the surface of the sun and no one knows why. At the top right is an effect known as the "diamond ring." It is the moment the first bit of sun emerges from behind the moon. I was surprised by just how suddenly it popped out, with all the brightness of the sun concentrated into a single point.
    Multifaceted Eclipse
  • It rained most of the morning at my campsite on Lost Twin Lake in the Cloud Peak Wilderness. The cold rain was at times accompanied by thunder and lightning, gusty winds, and graupel (snow pellets). Nearby waterfalls grew louder and the sound of a distant rock slide echoed across the lake. My plan of summiting Darton Peak would have to wait for another day. After the last rain shower, the clouds descended and obscured the highest peaks. I took this picture while enjoying a cup of hot coffee as the rain finally stopped. It's difficult to convey just how massive these cliffs are. The sheer granite walls rise 1-2 thousand feet above the lake. If you can see the white speck at the base of the cliff on the right, that is a tent. The top of this bowl-shaped valley, known as a cirque, was carved out by glaciers long ago.
    Clouds Descended
  • This backcountry thermal area is a 3.5 mile hike from the Lamar Valley trailhead. The water running through was not hot, but highly sulfuric. The sulfur gases could be seen bubbling through the mud.
    Backcountry Thermal Area
  • The Lower Falls of the Yellowstone River thunders over a cliff as seen from almost a mile away. At 309 feet high, this waterfall is nearly twice the height of Niagara Falls. It is the largest waterfall in the Rocky Mountains by volume, although the flow rate was a lot less in September when this was taken. The 24-mile long Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone starts here and in some places is over 1,000 feet deep. The canyon walls consist of a volcanic rock called rhyolite, and display a wide variety of colors. Hot springs and other geothermal features are scattered throughout the canyon along the river. If you look closely you can see a viewing platform just above the falls to the right.
    Falls of the Yellowstone
  • As the storm clouds approached, the outflow winds provided a cool breeze that felt nice on a hot day. This view is from the top of a bluff in East Peoria.<br />
<br />
Date Taken: June 18, 2014
    Cool Breeze
  • This is Missouri's highest waterfall, Mina Sauk Falls. The total height is 132 feet although it is split into several sections. It's a little tricky to get down to it, but it's a great place to cool off on a hot day.<br />
<br />
Date Taken: May 6, 2014
    Mina Sauk Falls
  • It was nearly 11pm in southern Saskatchewan. I had just watched a bright auroral substorm send colorful arcs high into the northern sky, but it was starting to fade. Then I turned around, looking south, and this is what I saw. A bright pinkish strip of light stretched from east to west, while the crescent moon hung low on the horizon. It's one of the most unusual things I've ever seen in the night sky. This strange type of aurora is called Steve. The name started as a joke, but it stuck.  Steve was first captured last year by a group of aurora photographers in Alberta. After ESA flew a satellite through it earlier this year, it was discovered that it's comprised of very hot (10,800°F) ionized gases moving along at 4 miles per second. This ribbon of light is 16 miles wide and thousands of miles long. I watched as Steve started overhead nearly paralleling the US-Canada border, before slowly moving south. It turned into a green "picket fence" pattern before fading away. It was awesome to see such a mysterious phenomena which is still being studied by scientists.
    Steve and the Moon
  • Borrego Palm Canyon is found where the San Ysidro Mountains meet the Sonoran Desert. This arid region of San Diego County receives only 6 inches of rain annually. But this place is vastly different than the surrounding terrain. Fed by underground springs coming to the surface, lush plants fill the canyon and colorful wildflowers are found around every corner. Even though the water flows year round, it disappears a short ways downstream. Numerous waterfalls tumble over the boulders and I had to be careful not to step on the many frogs hopping around. The dozens of fan palms that grow here are some of the last remaining naturally occurring palms left in California. This cool and shady oasis is the perfect place to visit on a hot afternoon and it's the most popular hike in Anza Borrego Desert State Park.
    Borrego Palm Canyon
  • The colors of sunset linger behind Bearhat Mountain in Glacier National Park. The beautiful Hidden Lake wraps around the base of the mountain, before the creek drops to the valley below. Normally there is more snow in this view, but most of it had melted after a hot summer. The distant Gunsight Mountain and Sperry Glacier can be seen on the left.
    Bearhat and Hidden Lake
  • It was the first time I've hiked to Solitude Falls and it was flowing pretty good. This was the start of a very hot day and it felt great to be standing here in the mist of the waterfall.
    Solitude Falls
  • In December of 2018 Comet 46P/Wirtanen flew by the Pleiades in the constellation Taurus. Also known as the Seven Sisters, this star cluster is one of the closest to Earth at a distance of about 444 light years away. The extra hot and luminous stars cast their light on the nearby reflection nebula, which gives it the blue color. Comet 46P/Wirtanen was at it's closest approach just 7.2 million miles (11.5 million km) away from Earth. This makes it one of the top 10 closest comet encounters of the Space Age. While they look the same size in this image, the comet is quite a bit fainter, just barely detectable to the naked eye. The nucleus of the comet is less than 1 mile wide, but it's diffuse coma (cometary atmosphere) is larger than the planet Jupiter.
    The Flyby
  • It was a colorful sunrise a the Terry Badlands. Scattered clouds lit up in every direction. The clouds also kept the morning cool before another very hot day.
    Terry Badlands Sunrise
  • It rained most of the morning at my campsite on Lost Twin Lake in the Cloud Peak Wilderness. The cold rain was at times accompanied by thunder and lightning, gusty winds, and graupel (snow pellets). Nearby waterfalls grew louder and the sound of a distant rock slide echoed across the lake. My plan of summiting Darton Peak would have to wait for another day. After the last rain shower, the clouds descended and obscured the highest peaks. I took this picture while enjoying a cup of hot coffee as the rain finally stopped. It's difficult to convey just how massive these cliffs are. The sheer granite walls rise 1-2 thousand feet above the lake. If you can see the white speck at the base of the cliff on the right, that is a tent. The top of this bowl-shaped valley, known as a cirque, was carved out by glaciers long ago.
    Clouds Descended B&W
  • At the end of June I returned to one of my favorite places: Bighorn Canyon. Located on the Wyoming-Montana border, this vast canyon ranges from 1,000 - 2,500 feet deep. The remote location and dry desert air makes it a great place for stargazing. But capturing a canyon on a dark night can be a challenge. In pictures they only appear as a dark void, since very little light makes it's way down between the steep walls. But on this night I had the assistance of the crescent moon just out of frame to the right. The moonlight was bright enough to light up the cliffs, but not bright enough to drown out the Milky Way. This natural arch is set back against a steep hillside, which meant there was really only one spot to place my camera. After a hot day, I heard several rockslides echo from down below. And while walking back to my car, I met a baby rattlesnake who was not too happy I was there.
    Window to the Universe
  • In a cirque at 10,000 feet in the Cloud Peak Wilderness during the middle of summer, it's pretty much paradise. There are no trails here, visitors must navigate their own route on steep boulder fields. Not knowing exactly what to expect is what makes it an adventure. At this elevation it never gets hot and some snowfields stay year round. Waterfalls and wildflowers abound under towering granite walls. 9 named lakes fill this high valley, plus countless unnamed tarns like this one. Each lake is different. One of them was still partially frozen, another had islands, and one a sandy beach perfect for swimming. It's the only place I've ever caught a fish with my bare hands. This was the easiest of the 3 creeks I waded through that day. The puffy cumulus clouds were a precursor to the thunderstorms that pop up most summer afternoons. Up here above treeline it's very exposed to the weather. I made it down to the protection of the forest before the first rumbles of thunder, but didn't escape getting rained on.
    Frozen Lake Falls