Most people associate Katmai with its famous grizzles. They are the star of the show, after all. However, there is an entirely different aspect to the National Park that very few people get out to explore.

In the summer of 1912, this park lay witness to one of the largest volcanic explosions of the century: the Novarupta explosion. It created an umbrella cloud 1000 miles wide, and expelled thirty times as much ash as Mt St Helens, lowering earth's temperature by more than a degree. The ash flow piled 700ft deep into the glaciated valley which now resembles a moonscape. This is the Valley of the 10000 smokes, so named for the innumerable fumeroles and vents that were observed in the aftermath of the explosion.

This valley is like no other: a vast ash-strewn landscape with nary a sign of vegetation stretching for miles into the horizon. The distant glacier-covered volcanoes are a reminder of the active nature of this region. In the late afternoon light, I snatched a few telephoto images of this mountainscape to capture the interplay of shadow and light.

Katmai National Park
AK USA