Rose Parade floats being built

All my pics are here. Questions? Email me.

--S.H.

The above photos are ©Steve Hymon and may not be reproduced or used elsewhere without my advanced written permission.

Honeymoon Lake solo backpack trip

Headed uphill past the old tungsten mine. 

First goal: get to the notch. 

Making some progress as the real switchbacks begin.

Made it! Lower Pine Creek Lake.

My campsite at Honeymoon. Don't camp there: terrible place! 

View across the lake. 

Sunset. 

I turned 50 this past summer and decided to take the advice of my old college buddy Laird, whose life motto may as well be: “when presented with a range of options, pick the one that appears to be the manliest.”

I decided to go solo backpacking. This was not the most super-manliest of choices, given that I would run into plenty of other solo people on the train, including some well older than 50. Still. I had never gone backpacking by myself and I thought this was a reasonably good selection and cheaper than buying a Harley, getting arrested in Vegas or jumping out of a plane, which I had already done (twice, actually).

As for a trail and destination, I selected one that I had long read about but never visited: the Pine Creek Pass trail to Honeymoon Lake in the Eastern Sierra. It’s known for being steep (rising about 3,000 feet in its first 2.5 mile or so) and relatively unpeopled compared to others in the Eastern Sierra. This was an important consideration as I’ve not quite felt by people-person best for much of 2016. 

It turned out to be a great choice because:

•Because the trail is not super popular, you don’t have to wait to park at the trailhead or park very far from the trail, as is the case at most of the big Eastern Sierra trailheads these days.

•I got a great campsite at Honeymoon Lake, which was as lovely as advertised. There were a few others camping in the area, but I barely saw them.

•There was plenty to explore in the area — namely a nice day hike to Pine Creek Pass and French Lake, as well as a visit to the lower Granite Park area that is en route to Italy Pass.

Let’s talk briefly about the hike up the hike. To put it delicately, it’s a steep motherfucker with little shade until you reach Lower Pine Creek Lake. I started about 8:15 a.m. on an early August morning and that’s about as late as anyone should start, especially if it’s during a warm spell.

The lower half of the trail is noticeably uphill and then becomes buttkickingly uphill after the trail peters out as an old mining road and becomes a rocky footpath with many, many steps until you get to the John Muir Wilderness boundary at about the two-mile mark. It mellows a tad between there and the first lake, but be warned: your fitness will be tested.

My pit bull mix at Arroyo Burro in Santa Barbara at sunset

Didn't have my regular flash, so I used the on-camera flash to blast her with just enough light. The wide angle lens I was using is big enough to unfortunately block some of that light, the reason her mouth area is so dark. Lesson learned: keep the flash in my bag.

All my photos are here. Questions? Email me. 

--S.H.

The above photo is ©Steve Hymon and may not be reproduced or used elsewhere without my advanced written permission.

Cincinnati skyline on a rainy day in late autumn when I was in a profoundly dark mood and needed to shoot something to avoid completely losing my shit for good

Shot these quickly after a visit to the Cincinnati Art Museum's "Kentucky Renaissance: The Lexington Camera Club and Its Community, 1954-1974." As the exhibit points out, the guys in the camera club bounced ideas off one another, experimented and shot images that are as easily as good as those of people who got a lot more famous. The exhibit closes Jan. 1 -- the photography is great and I guarantee if you like to shoot you will be deeply inspired. 

My pics above? Not quite as good although the top two aren't terrible -- although they look like something I would have shot in high school if I had been smart enough to drive to Mt. Adams with my camera (I wasn't; I was pretty much a fucking idiot back then, perhaps slightly improved since but I'll leave that up to you). 

All my photos are here. Questions? Email me. 

--S.H.

The above photos are ©Steve Hymon and may not be reproduced or used elsewhere without my advanced written permission.

Pico House on Olvera Street in DTLA at sunset

All my photos are here. Questions? Email me. 

--S.H.

The above photos are ©Steve Hymon and may not be reproduced or used elsewhere without my advanced written permission.