A great "Eastern Sierra Morning Scramble" (ESMS) is a plate of “Golden Hour” light, beautiful puffy white clouds, and a side of water (a still lake or a running stream will do.)
When you get up to enjoy an ESMS that is cooked just right, it truly is a moving experience! Sorry for the food reference but we have eaten twice at the Aberdeen Resort in the last couple of weeks and good food is on my mind!
Majestic Scene
The problem is that to truly enjoy an ESMS you need to get up pretty early to get served. Once nature runs out it is gone till dinner! I usually get up early for work so you would think it should be easy for me to get up early for an enjoyable ESMS. Unfortunately, I tend to enjoy sleeping in on days I don’t work.
So when that alarm goes off at 4AMish there is an epic battle between good and evil. Evil is to fall into the sins of the body and continue to enjoy that comfy warm bed. Good is forget the temptations of the flesh and get up and go to enrich your spirituality.
My past routine was to silence the alarm and lay there for a bit re-thinking of where to go. What I was really debating was if I should get out of bed. If "Good" is winning I get up and take a peak outside the bedroom window. If the wind is blowing or it looks like a cloudless sky it is like "Evil" gave "Good" a knock out punch and I jump back into bed to the temptress' warm sheets.
That routine has cost me to miss out on some epic ESMSs. So I have begun to try the stoic method to give "Good" the advantage over "Evil." Here is my simple two step stoic method:
Jump out of bed. Don’t let the temptress of warm sheets sing her siren of evil to get me to stay.
Use Shawn Achor’s (author of “The Happiness Advantage”) 20 second rule. His research has found that you greatly increase your chances to continue a positive habit by making it three to 20 seconds easier to start a good habit. So now I get everything ready the night before so it is just a grab and go. Saving way more than 20 seconds!
The new method seems to give “Good” a big competitive advantage over “Evil.” Not perfect but a way better winning percentage.
This particular morning “Good” won. I got up and went. As I was driving the clouds that had a chance to turn colors seemed to be best in the east so Hot Creek won out over Convict Lake. As the sky was lightening up I was bummed. Several of the spots I normally shoot were already occupied by folks illegally camping. It was still pretty early so I did not want to wake them up tromping around with my camera and tripod.
Turned out being considerate was the right choice. Shooting at the Hot Creek’s little white bridge turned into a “target” rich environment.
The location was the perfect recipe for an ESMS. Beautiful warm light, high clouds that the sun was painting with wonderful colors, and a wonderful running stream!
So sit back while I replay the wondrous ESMS morning:
Pre-Sunrise with the clouds hinting of what's to come!
I had time to take pictures at as the sunrise unfolded and in different spots.
Hot Creek Alpemglow
A nice person made a comment on my Facebook post of the image below that summed the scene in one word perfectly "majestic!”
Hot Creek's Little White Bridge
So I figured I had captured the bridge as best as I could so I would try some other spots and compositions. I don't think you could have taken a bad picture this particular morning.
Sunlight playing with the top of the sage!
The moment when you realized it was a good decision to get up that morning
I then packed up my camera and tripod and decided to wander the fire roads while I let the ESMS digest. Doing so I found nice spot on the north side of Hot Creek.
I also found a more direct route to the Chalk Bluffs.
A ton of chalk!
Finally, the "Golden Hour" magic light was pretty much gone and I thought I would finish the shoot with a nice shot of the Eastern Sierra under some nice puffy white clouds.
Just another boring view in the middle of knowwhere
But the days ESMS was not done. Driving back to our condo Mammoth Mountain, under those puffy white clouds, was just too majestic to pass up.
Hope you enjoyed the story. Hope to see some of you out there enjoying your ESMS sometime. Love to hear your thoughts.