Dark Night Skies: Endangered Resource?

Dark sky night photography in Northern Nevada.

Dark sky night photography in Northern Nevada, before the annual temporary Black Rock City of 70,000 forms in August?September.

Many photographers are taking up night photography, but with increasing population and development comes more light pollution. Truly dark nights, and dark places, are becoming harder to come by.

So where can you to to find dark skies for miles, some of the darkest skies in the world?

The Bureau of Land Management’s Black Rock Desert – High Rock Canyon Emigrant Trail National Conservation Area offers a view of the sky at least 120 air miles from Reno. Make sure you top off with gas before you pass Gerlach, and have plenty of tire repair supplies along if you head out on the area’s unpaved roads.

Death Valley National Park has been designated as an International Dark Sky Park by the International Dark-Sky Association (IDA), but the bright lights of Las Vegas can be seen on the horizon from as far as 110 or more miles away:

Milky Way arch over Death Valley’s Badwater Basin.

For the darkest skies in Death Valley, it’s best to go to the far northern end of the park to escape light pollution. The roads in and out of the area may be closed in the winter due to snow, or may close on short notice due to storm damage.

Dark sky near Massacre Rim

The area around the Massacre Rim Wilderness Study Area in far northern Washoe County, Nevada has been designated as an International Dark Sky Sanctuary, but leave yourself plenty of daylight time to find foreground subjects. You’ll also need to be very self-sufficient or caravan with friends for support, as there are no services in the 120 miles of mostly unpaved roads between Denio Junction, Nevada and Cedarville, California.

Where can you enjoy dark skies but be closer to civilization for services like motels? California’s Bodie State Historic Park sits down in a valley where the minimal light pollution from nearby towns Bridgeport, Lee Vining and Hawthorne is mostly blocked from view by the surrounding Bodie Hills. One catch is that the Park is closed at night, so you’ll need to join a photography workshop to get a few good hours in the Park before the 1am exit deadline:

Milky Way arch over Bodie’s Standard Mill

Not far away, Mono Lake has been a haven for night photographers, with most of the light from California’s Central Valley clocked by the massive granite batholith of the Sierra Nevada. There is some light from Mammoth Lakes, Bridgeport and Hawthorne, especially when low level clouds catch the light and bounce it over nearby hills, but the much of the sky seems relatively unaffected on the more common typical nights.

That’s the town of Lee Vining illuminating the adjacent mountains to the right.

There is however a large hotel and housing development planned just south of the existing light signature of Lee Vining. Perhaps it’s inevitable, but how soon do we want to erode a rare and precious resource that brings people to the area?

A closer view at light in Lee Vining. A new development would appear to the right of existing lights.

While individual counties in California may let their dark skies slip away, the State of Nevada is positioning itself to intercept any business that California turns away:

White Pocket in Utah’s Vermillion Cliffs National Monument has been getting attention in recent years, but with over a dozen miles of deep sand 4WD roads to reach the trailhead. Lying high on a plateau, White Pocket has a good view of light pollution from Page, Arizona, only 24 miles east. Kanab, Utah is only 35 miles in the opposite direction, and Hurricane/St. George is about 80 miles west. It’s still a worthy destination for foreground interest, just be prepared to do a little creative post-processing to minimize glow on the horizon in the night shots.

Multiple light sources are visible from Vermilion Cliffs.

A lot of the best night skies in the American West are dark specifically because they are remote and almost dangerously inaccessible. California’s Eastern Sierra is a welcome exception at the moment, but will it remain an attractive place for photographers, astronomy clubs, meteor shower watchers and other night sky enthusiasts into the future? Most areas of Inyo County are already threatened by light From Las Vegas, Mojave and Bishop. Will the remaining enclaves in Mono County be threatened next?

It may be too late to minimize the impact of larger towns like Kanab, Utah or Page, Arizona, but Lee Vining and Mono County still have a precious resource to protect.

Action alert: Threat to scenic Mono Basin, letters needed by August 21
www.monolake.org/today/2019/08/15/action-alert-threat-to-…

Huge thanks to the Mono Lake Committee for their support for this rare and precious resource!

Where do you like viewing dark night skies?

The town of Bishop sends ample light pollution over the adjacent White Mountains, where astronomy clubs often gather to try to view (what’s left of) the night sky!

Night time-lapse video from that water in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert…

Jeff Sullivan

Jeff Sullivan leads landscape photography workshops in national parks and public lands throughout California and the American West.