Two Rocks, Morning - Racetrack Playa. Death Valley National Park, California. April 3, 2006. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell - all rights reserved. This photograph is not in the public domain. It may not be used on websites, blogs, or in any other media without explicit advance permission from G Dan Mitchell. When I originally added this photo here I neglected to give any background. As I describe in a comment below, I strongly prefer to arrive at the Racetrack in the late afternoon and stay through the following morning, preferably on a night with a full moon - and then shoot like crazy: afternoon, evening, night, pre-dawn, morning. Every so often you find yourself in circumstances so amazing that you can only be thankful that you somehow ended up in a particular place at that particular time. This was one of those times. I got up very early and headed out onto the playa. I was virtually alone, the wind was screaming across the flat surface... and it was clouded over. I wondered if I was going to get anything worthwhile. As the day began, the lower clouds began to break up, and as they did the remaining cloud shadows raced across the vast surface of the playa under the influence of the strong winds. While landscapes can be static sometimes, this one was anything but. I've been to the Racetrack several times, but I've never again seen a morning with a conditions like this - the moving clouds, the lenticulars over the distant range, the clear air. I'm glad I was able to photograph it - but I'd remember this trip even if I had not brought a camera.