"Thanks for all the tips on the Gulch," he said, and soon we were sitting in the open back of a truck as it pulled along a sand valley. The Navajo guide dropped us off at the Canyon entrance, chatted with us a while, and then left. Upper Antelope was much smaller - 150 meters, but it was beautiful. There were 4 or 5 photographers already in the canyon. Antelope, it seems, has become the landscape photographers ultimate exposure challenge. Half hour exposure times in dark variable light. A good testing ground, I guess.

In an hour, the Navajo guide returned for us, and shuttled us to our Jeeps, showing us pictures and talking about schools and cooking and canyons. I parted ways with the photographer, having spent hours talking about Utah and Oregon and Greece and the Virgin Islands, exchanging business cards, and I headed south along the Marble Cliffs, stopping at the Glen Canyon Navajo dam to look at jewelry for a friend. There were dozens of carved animals. "This one means eternal life" she said. "And this one is peace and lightness"

"And this one here is courage," she said, explaining Navajo religion.

I pointed to the turtle. "What does that one mean?"

"Nothing," she said.

"I'll take it."

Desert Southwest Anza Borrego The Barren Desert The Channel Islands Windblown zoology off the coast of Los Angeles Colorado Plateau, Navajo Country Mesa to Canyon along the Plateau Death Valley The Saltwater Fish of Death Valley Mojave National Preserve Wandering the Eastern Mojave High Desert Stories from California's High Desert Areas Los Angeles Gray River in the Sun Los Angeles Map Imperial Valley Death and Salvation on the New River Panamint Valley Panamint Valley Roach Motel White Sands and Southern New Mexico Atomic Agriculture on the Rio Grande The Salton Sea Bombay Beach and the Salton Sea Slab City and the New River Death and Salvation on the New River Trona, California Trona and the Unusual Lake Searles Western Mojave Four Seasons of the Mojave Los Angeles Coast Images and captions from the LA coast.