In the shadows of the Catskill mountains lies Minnewaska State Park Preserve. Just below Catskill State Park and a short ride from I-87 along route 55. Minnewaska was established in 1993 after the land was purchased by the state in 1987. A newbie by a lot of parks standards. It was a legal battle to keep development off the property, but thankfully it was preserved and bought from private hands. In 1996 a significant increase of land was added to the park and is maintained by the Nature Conservancy. The 5,400 acre portion added is now referred to as Sam’s point bringing the total to 21,106 acres. The easiest accessibility by car is to Awosting falls and Minnewaska lake. It’s about 2hrs driving out of NYC to get there. It is definitely worth the trip if you are into waterfalls. Not just that though. It is part of a bigger area known as ‘The Gunks.’ More technically known as the Shawgunks.

As you pull in there is a small booth where you pay a 7$ parking fee to help the park. Worth it as they just built a new composting toilet house with ventilation and renewably powered I am told. Definitely a nice touch instead of a walk off into the woods for a private moment.The parking lot is about a quarter mile from the trail head of Awosting falls. At the trail head you can find several smaller falls before reaching the 60 foot drop. The walk to the bottom of the falls is along a decline that can wind you on the way back up. Remember to look around though as this area is filled with all sorts of flora and fauna hiding. The main attraction is definitely the falls, but it shouldn’t be all you have come to see.

Once at the bottom of the trail you can have easy access to either side of the falls.

From the left side you can even make your way around to the back of the falls. A real treat as you can’t do that with just any waterfall. There is a lot of spray so do keep that in mind. Crossing the stream behind this picture you can access the right side of the falls and get close, but not behind the falls themselves. However the rock formations are a real treat.

As you can probably tell the dynamic range of the scene was quite wide. You have three options in my opinion besides properly using your polarizer (one of which I forgot about):

1. Stopping down to bring as many details into the highlights as possible. You will lose shadows, but I feel it’s the better of two evils and if anything can add to the image
2. Shooting a High Dynamic Range Compilation series of exposures and pull it into one image as seen above.
3. Lastly, the one I forgot to do is using a split grad filter. Holding it in front of the lens to bring down the brightness in the sky (I forgot they were in my bag, Doh!)

Don’t forget Minnewaska Lake. You can drive up a sharp winding trail (becareful!) and park right next to it. The rock formations are beautiful and with the right sky it just all comes together. This image is also an HDR as the latitude here is just too massive between the [what was] dark trees and brilliant sky.

In case you are curious the two HDR images were compiled from NEF RAW files using Photomatrix Pro 3.0. I also wanted to let you all know I am working on a project on how to sleeve my tripod legs and safely wonder into the water. I have to run tests, but I am optimistic. I am definitely curious if you all would find it useful. Also put the Sigma 50-500mm to the test; stay tuned!