Drove to Grandview Point last night, which is about 10 miles east on the Desert View Drive that parallels the canyon rim. People were listening to music in a car in the parking lot even though it was quite dark when I arrived. Usually visitors leave right after the sun sets from these view points. Occasionally they would start up their car and turn the headlights on, not a great thing to happen if you’re looking for dark skies. I set up as far from the parking as possible, setting 1 camera to do a one hour time-lapse photo. Though I thought at one point the series might have been ruined by this activity, turns out the photos were fine. I decided to move to another location, even though the tourists in the car had appeared to have gone to sleep in the parking lot.
I found a turn-out along the Desert View Drive that Ann and I had seen before. There was a large rock formation close to the parking area called ‘The Duck’. Ann heard a tour guide tell his group that in recent years the bill had fallen off. It was the coldest night so far so I waited in the car for the 11:42pm moonrise. About 11 a car pulls into the lot behind me and shuts off its lights. Since the parking was right at the spot where I would be setting up my tripod, I was a bit worried.Then about 20 minutes later the people leave. The last quarter moon rise directly in front of me. I managed to shoot for about 45 minutes without any distractions.
