Friday, June 17, 2016

Palouse Back Roads, Washington

As I mentioned in my two previous posts, back roads are the way to go in the Palouse.  There is no traffic, it is easy to find a place to stop, and maybe you will discover a location that isn’t photographed very often.


Most of our Palouse photos were taken on dirt or gravel roads, and sometimes I found that the roads themselves were great photo opportunities.  This one was near Steptoe.


How did we decide which roads to take?  This one is Rim Rock Road near Colton, Washington.  In this case we just had a few minutes and took a turn at random near our B&B in Uniontown.


I like S-curves, and roads often have this great composition element.  We found this road near St John on a “Photographing the Palouse” brochure that highlighted barns, lone trees, windmills, and abandoned houses.


This is another dirt road near Steptoe.  The rolling hills and fields were wonderful to explore.  The best resource for finding back roads was a map of Whitman County, Washington that shows every little dirt track.  I picked it up at the county offices in Colfax on a previous trip.


I loved the way this road followed a bank covered with wildflowers that led right to a lone tree near Steptoe.  It is important to be cautious on these roads.  You will be a long way from help, and may not have cell phone coverage, so if you don’t have four wheel drive, keep out of mud holes and loose sand.  We didn’t take chances, and turned back twice in our four days in the Palouse, but we had a wonderful time.

As always, please do not use our photos for any reason without our permission.  Thanks.

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