Day 3

The next morning found the area socked in. Lower elevations were receiving on-and-off rain while the higher were receiving snow. We pulled up to Starbucks and planned to get a coffee and cook breakfast outside. I went in for coffee while Ben stayed out and cooked pancakes.

By the time I came out with coffee. It was raining pretty good. Ben bailed on breakfast and was scrambling to get things packed away. I handed him his coffee and said I'd go back in and buy us breakfast. New plan, we sat and ate inside Starbucks while the rain came down outside.

After breakfast, we toured around the mountain passes. Many areas were getting slammed while others barely had any snow. Finally,  we got the drones out on the non-snowy side, took a few images, and then headed south; destination, the Utah deserts.

The deserts of Utah are quite unique. We threw the drones up for a better look. Off in the distance, we could see the Mars Desert Research Station. The colors in the area were quite neat! I’ll definitely be returning to this area under better lighting conditions! This was a bit of a scouting trip. With that, we moved on to the Factory Butte area for sunset.

Factory Butte stands pretty much alone and is way out there! I threw the drone up in order to get a warmer image during the sunset timeframe as we were parked on the southeast side of the butte. The distance between myself and the butte really pushed the allowable limits for proper drone flight. That rock is further away than it seems! Regardless, I got “an image” of the Butte but not “the image.” This is another spot on this trip that will not be getting checked off of my list-o-places-to-shoot. I’ll have to return here, soon.

With the drones back on the ground and the sun having set, it was time to focus on dinner. Ben cooked up some Fettuccine Alfredo. We had a bit of a problem getting the noodles to fully cook due to the winds in the area. It was difficult to get the water temp up long enough on the noodles, so they were a bit aldante^2. You know what they say, “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger; unless you are Mario. Then, what doesn’t kill you makes you smaller.”

With that, we wrapped up the day and began setting our sights on the morning’s sunrise. We’d not have to go far as we were already where we planned on shooting!