Monument Rocks

In western Kansas, amongst the crops that blanket this flat land, lie Monument Rocks, a series of rock formations, columns of chalk that jut out of the landscape like a sore thumb...  

I first heard about Monument Rocks in May 2008 when two of my favorite photographers, Moose Peterson and Laurie Excell, stopped by the area while chasing storms across the Southwest and Midwest.  I was curious, as I was born in Kansas and spent my first eight years or so living there, had visited off and on over the years, and yet had never heard of this place.  

In July 2009 I returned to Kansas to visit family, and I made a note to stop at Monument Rocks as I passed through the area.  A short side trip down a two lane road, then seven miles through pasture land and I was there...  

I spent some time walking around the area, and looking east through a hole in one of the columns, I could see another, smaller column off in the distance.  Using the hole in the column of chalk as a frame was an obvious, but still interesting shot...

This past weekend I was passing through the area again, and I made a point of making this part of our trip.  Again I spent time exploring, and with the sun setting I took advantage of this to incorporate a starburst (by stopping down to f16) in a couple of many of my shots.  First I shot the same hole in the rock column as last time, this time facing east, making sure to include a good amount of sky in the shot...

Then I moved in closer, eliminating the sky around the edges of the photo...

Moving north a little way, I liked how the sun shone through a small notch in the top of this rock formation, so again I went for the starburst...

On the northern end of the rock formations I noticed that the clouds were taking on some character, so I decided to include more of the sky in a few shots.  When I was processing photos later it quickly became apparent that going with a black and white look may be interesting...

Monument Rocks is a little known place literally out in the middle of nowhere, not really a  "destination", but if you're in the area and need to stop and stretch your legs for a bit, it's a nice break from the endless miles of corn fields and cow pastures...

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First photo taken using a Nikon D40 with a Nikkor 18-55 DX lens
Second photo taken using a Nikon D40 with a Nikkor 55-200 DX VR lens
Last four photos taken using a Nikon D7000 with a Nikkor 16-85 DX VR lens