We’re up early and ready for the hike through the Devil’s Garden trails
that take off near the campground, probably 4 miles or so roundtrip. The morning is thankfully cool with clouds
forming in the distance; perfect weather.
We should be done by mid-day heat.
Lots of water and snacks are packed along with camera and lenses,
battery fully charged, tripod in tow, and off we go. We are looking forward to seeing Landscape
Arch, the longest arch in the park measuring 306’ from base to base. It also has quite an ominous past. In 1991 a rock slab 60’ long, 11’ wide, and
4’ thick fell from the underside, likely due to heavy rains and excess water
seepage, and leaving behind an even thinner ribbon of rock. Needless to say, hikers in the area had quite
a scare.
About
a mile in we see it up ahead and I begin to assemble the camera and check my
settings. An error message appears, “no
CF card installed”! I panic realizing I
had left the card in the card reader the night before when I downloaded the
photos from Canyonlands. I quickly went
through the menu and found a function, “shoot without card” and clicked it to
on. Excitedly I think Canon has thought
of everything for the forgetful user, wondering if the camera has some kind of
internal memory of its own!
We
continued on, shooting great cloud formations over Landscape Arch, then
backtracking and taking side trails to Pine Tree and Tunnel Arches, stopping
many times along the way to chat with other visitors, compare stories. It’s really amazing how many folks are out
traveling, not only from all over the US, but internationally as well.
Returning
just as the day is heating up; I connect the camera to the computer via USB and
get a “no photos stored” message. I contact
Canon customer support and the kindly rep informs me “No, no internal memory. Sorry, no way to retrieve photos. You must have card installed.” There must be another “3rd Rule”
appropriate to this situation; maybe “3 cards or you’re out”! I do now carry a 2nd card in the
gear bag, however. (I am hoping to find
a link to insert here that will capture the dramatic beauty of the Devil's Garden Trails.)
The
day was not wasted, however. We wiled
away the afternoon reading until dusk then drove out to the Windows Section,
another side road off the main. We did
the short hikes to North and South Windows, then on to Turret Arch, with the
sun setting behind it. The parking lot
was full of tour buses and the trails loaded with multi-national
travelers.
Note: By the time you read this we will be dining
in Torrey, UT, near our Capitol Reef NP location, and hopefully using their
wifi. Internet reception has been scarce
in these remote canyon locations. After
Arches we headed on to Bluff (thanks Happy Trails!)……
4 comments:
Oh no!! How disappointing for you. I have done that before but my camera does have some internal memory - not much though. I did follow your link. I can only imagine that your pictures would have been just as good or better. At least you got some good shots later in the day.
I've done the same thing with my Canon. I actually went back and "re-shot" some photos of Pie Town in NM. I did a ranger led hike back in June at Arches. It was a little difficult since I had to scramble on some rocks and "jump" across some fissures. I ♥ Utah! :-)
Not only would I be upset with myself forgetting the card, but why have a function to shoot without card if there isn't one.
Apparently, according to Canon, the "shoot without card" function is when the camera is tethered to the computer!
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