March 31, 2014 Mojave Lenticular Chase

It had been a few months since I had done a desert photo trip, I had this Monday off, and a Pacific storm was approaching California.  What does this mean?  It means I needed to get up to the western Mojave Desert and southern Owens Valley to chase lenticular clouds!  I met my friend Jody in Granada Hills, and we were north of the town of Mojave by noon.  Somewhat strong westerly winds were blowing through the Mojave Desert, and a handful of lenticulars were already starting to look fabulous when we stopped near Pearsonville.

That one lenticular cloud with the brief “tail” was pretty wild!  It looked like we would be in Fat City for the day as far as lenticulars were concerned, as mid-level winds would be increasing through the afternoon.  These lenticulars, just to the east of Pearsonville, dissipated a bit, though.  The ultimate goal on this day was to find a fabulously stacked lenticular, or “wave cloud”, around sunset.  With sunset still six hours away, I decided to head on up to the Owens Lake area to see what conditions were like up there.  The southern end of the Owens Valley rarely fails to impress, and fail it did not on this afternoon.  There was plenty of blowing dust on the dry lake, and interesting clouds along the Sierra Nevada and toward the Inyos.

The images above were taken along Highway 190 between Olancha and Keeler.  Jody and I had to battle winds which were gusting to about 50 mph.  Fortunately, it was not too chilly, with a temperature near 60F.  Though there was a bit of a Sierra wave evident, the wave clouds were not impressive.  After a stop in Keeler for a swim, we headed back south through Panamint Valley towards Trona.

Jody and I were hoping for a sunset shoot at the Trona Pinnacles, but at Trona the sky was kind of blah and partly cloudy without any lenticulars nearby.  We continued south towards Red Mountain, with a couple of stops along the way.  Some distant lenticulars were worth photographing in the now cold and strong west wind south of Red Mountain.  As it turned out, the best wave clouds of the day were early on, around noon near Pearsonville.