Ok, so maybe I’m getting a bit tongue in cheek with this title, but bare with me. What I’m referring to here is the fact that of the dozens of times I’ve been on Chisik Island, this small island just offshore of Lake Clark National Park, I’ve rarely have been able to leave when schedule to do so. And when I have, events conspired to return me right back to it. But in all honestly, being marooned on such a stunning island in Alaska can hardly be considered a curse.
Camera
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Behind the Photo
The island has this classic wedge shape to its profile that you see when they’ve tangled with glaciers in their past. The trick was how to reflect the scale of this particular mountain that towers above all else at the north end. I used an old photographer’s trick of going low and framing the shot with something in the foreground that the viewers eye could use as scale. I also used the cumulus clouds to my advantage by choosing an angle that would include them as well, and of course they add some drama to the photograph as well..
Chisik Island
In 1909 President Theodore Roosevelt, founder of the Boone and Crockett Club, established Chisik Island and its smaller neighbor Duck Island as a wildlife refuge for the birds that called the island home. Later in 1980 they were included as a subunit of the Gulf of Alaska Unit of the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge. There is a small patch of land on the north end granted to the native families of the area, and a small area on the south end which encompassed Snug Harbor Cannery.
The cliffs feature in my photograph reach a height of 400’. Depending on the amount of snowpack deposited during the winter, there are numerous waterfalls that cascade of the top of the peak.
