The Earth Reclaims Its Survivors: Photographs near Lolo Pass, MT
The land takes back what it wants whether stone or metal.
Personal projects are one of the most important activities a photographer — or any artist actually — can do. It keeps us focused, creating, and always making. And it helps with maintaining sanity in a world where that seems to be a rare, and precious, commodity.
I have an ongoing project of shooting the earth taking back what humans have added. I see this much more in the pacific northwest and the midwest than I do in the deserts.
An abandoned house in the desert may take decades to crumble. An abandoned factory in Georgia is consumed by Kudzo in about 22 and a half minutes.
I’ve photographed farmhouses in Virginia nearly consumed by bushes, and rock buildings in the Arizona deserts that are still in relatively good condition even after being abandoned for 4 or 5 decades. The process is far slower in the dry heat of the deserts southwest, but it is there.
The portfolio is constantly growing. Having a project keeps the mind sharp and on the lookout for possible images to add whenever out.
This particular morning I was riding from Grangeville, Idaho to Lolo, Montana. Lolo is just south of Missoula and sits at the base of Lolo Pass.
Highway 12, Lolo Pass, is one of the motorcyclist's must-ride roads. It twists and turns from Lolo west to the top of the pass at about 5200 feet. What it lacks in high altitude, it makes up for in sheer, utter beauty.
The road then meanders down toward Grangeville and eventually along the banks of several rivers that grow from small to bigass as tributary after tributary join what becomes the rapidly flowing and wide South fork Clearwater River.
I needed to get off the bike and change gloves so I began that long dance of slowing down enough to turn off if it looked good, but not too slow that traffic behind me would get pissed.
You don’t want to be barreling along at 50MPH and suddenly try to slow down enough to charge onto soft gravel on a big cruiser. No sirree. When big cruisers encounter deep gravel, they simply roll over… with the riders on top. They are a bit temperamental.
I saw what looked like old cars in the distance and began slowing down. I had nothing to worry about, there was no traffic behind or in front of me. It was very quiet this cool summer morning.
This is the sight that awaited me.
Chevrolet trucks.
All of them are Chevies.
I counted about 15 sitting on the side of the road with the bushes and trees growing right up through the dashboards, floorboards, and engine housings.
I dismounted and sat for a moment listening to the sound of the river, and the birds, and the hum of a bee hive just a few dozen yards down. The bees seemed to be indifferent to me, so I just sat there and listened to the quiet tunes of nature.
The place was seemingly deserted. There wasn’t anyone around. So I take my camera out and start to look around for something to shoot.
Like a Chevy pickup truck with bullet holes in the window. A real Bonnie and Clyde feeling to that one.
The light was not very good, but I took photos anyway because how often am I gonna get up to this road when I live in Phoenix? The answer is not too many damn times. And I want to be here as much as possible.
I want to see this road in the snow, and in the greenest of the spring. I want to listen to the river as it rushes through ice and crashes and careens from the melting runoff. Perhaps I will.
But this morning was guaranteed me so the Nikon and I had some fun.
The colors were magnificent in the bit of backlight I could muster. And I grabbed about a dozen images of pure texture before snatching an apple out of my daypack, walking across the silent two-lane highway to sit on the edge of that beautiful river.
The amount of rust on that little half acre or so would make the folks at Rustoleum inspired enough to open a TikTok channel so they could share their happy dances. I could almost hear the trucks rusting under the bright August sun.
Or was that the bees getting a bit upset at something? Bees are like Karen’s at a fast food joint that didn’t put enough ketchup in the bag. They can go from mildly upset to supremely pissed off throwing napkin dispensers and plastic forks in about a half second — and for no real reason at all.
I gingerly made it over to the bike, decided that I didn’t have time for the helmet at that point, fired it up, and got the hell out of Dodge. The bees didn’t give chase, and about a mile or so down the road, I pulled over and put the helmet back on.
I would ride without it, but it is a promise I made to my wife, and so it stays on top of the noggin whenever I am riding. It’s black, super high-tech, and makes me look like a Star Wars stormtrooper on a geezer bike. That’s important, for so many reasons.
My wife, daughter, and I went through this same spot 8 weeks later, and there were fall colors and better light. My girls had a blast making photos and videos, but I didn’t get many shots that day.
I just sat on the banks of the river.
And listened to the water pass by.
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I am a photographer, designer, and photo editor. You can find me at my self-named website or at Project 52 Pro System where I teach commercial photography online. This is our tenth year of teaching, and it is the most unique online class you will find anywhere.
You can find my books on Amazon, and I have taught two classes at CREATIVELIVE.