(gentle music) - There's something about contrasts that seem to be sharper, more clear when you travel.

A drive on Interstate 15 through Las Vegas, Nevada at rush hour is starkly different than a drive here just an hour away.

And as this drive leads further from the energy of Sin City, another kind of vibrancy is discovered.

(air puffing) A place where ancient sandstone emerges from the surrounding desert floor and paints a frame alive with color.

We come up over the trail and there's this combination of colors all in one frame that you can grab.

There's purple, there's yellow, there's the sandstone kind of blondish color.

Valley of Fire State Park in Nevada is often overlooked with nearby Zion and Grand Canyon National Parks fighting for the spotlight.

It's stopping and looking at the little things when you get close to the sandstone.

And to really study the rock and look at it and appreciate the time and the forces of nature that have shaped this landscape into what it is today is what I always find myself thinking about.

But an adventure here with camera in hand will never disappoint.

Nobody loves a slot canyon, nobody more than me.

Actually, Zack might.

Do you like slot canyon as more than me, Zack?

- Well, I think so.

I like-- We'll just play the slots here.

- (laughs) We're gonna play the slots here.

Like any adventure, there will be events occasionally unforeseen.

First-aid kit.

- It's not nothing too bad.

- I want to see the wound.

- It's just a little gouge.

- But in this place where light and stone play a symphony every day, those who've discovered it have a tough time letting go of its beauty.

- I end up in places, camping in places, hiking and living in places that call to me and oftentimes I go through an area and I don't hear the call.

And then other times like this place and many others, they call so loud that you don't want to leave.

(thunderclap) - When you travel, the world becomes a smaller place.

When you explore with friends that share a love of photography, destinations come to life.

- This water is emerald green.

- We tell the stories of travel with our cameras, capturing some of the most beautiful locations on earth.

But every adventure reveals more than what's in the frame.

Thunderboomers, we see them popping up right now.

(thunderclap) The people, the food and unexpected turns in the journey.

Now they're going to swim right with us.

(cheering) Brings the full experience of travel into focus.

- [Narrator] Outside Beyond The Lens, brought to you by Visit Fresno County.

Nature, diversity found in the heart of California's Central Valley.

Stay in Fresno or Clovis and drive to three nearby national parks.

By Hedrick's Chevrolet.

Supporting the spirit of travel in each of us.

Every journey has a first step.

Start your next adventure here.

By Fresno Yosemite International Airport.

Rediscover your love for travel with more options, more flights, more connecting you to the people and the places you love.

And by Visit Yosemite Madera County.

California's gateway to Yosemite National Park.

Explore the outdoor magic of Madera County and be inspired to discover more.

And by viewers like you.

(upbeat music) (gentle music) - The desert is a place I always feel at home.

I'm not entirely sure why that is but I know that every time I come to landscapes like this to film, it's hard for me to leave.

Valley of Fire State Park is about an hour north of Las Vegas, Nevada, but a world away when it comes to what you'll find here.

David Boomer and I have shot here before, but this will be the first time for Zack Allen and after a six hour drive in the Battle Van from Clovis, California, we do our best to slip past the Las Vegas tractor beam that has pulled us in all too many times before.

All right.

After a long day of driving and from central California, the Fresno Clovis area to Las Vegas, Nevada.

We are arriving into Las Vegas.

I have Zack Allen.

(car beeping) Whoops, I'm swerving.

I got a little warning from the car there.

The Battle Van yelled at me.

- Stay in your lane, bro.

- Stay in my lane, bro.

And Dave Boomer, he's back there.

He's sleeping.

The wind's really blowing hard right now, which I always, when I drive through Las Vegas when I'm coming through, like when we're like, if we go to like Zion or anywhere in Utah and we're coming through Vegas, I always like to try to come through here and beat the rush hour traffic like around four or five o'clock so we're-- What time is it, Zack?

- 3:20 - Yeah, 3:20 so we got 3:20 right now and we're moving through town and going to kind of beat the rush hour here, we hope.

And get north of Vegas to Valley of Fire State Park.

The turnoff for Valley of Fire from Interstate 15 is easily found and leads east towards a somewhat regular looking desertscape for the first 10 miles.

If you've never been here before, you might be asking yourself why you left the pool and that two hour massage you had booked at the spa back in Vegas.

But trust me, just hang on for another mile and you'll see why this is one of our favorite places to shoot.

Just after entering the park, we're greeted by the Valley of Fire welcoming committee, also known as desert bighorn sheep.

(gentle music) These guys are usually shier in the Valley of Fire, but can be found if you look up high on the hillsides while driving toward the western side of the park.

I've never seen desert bighorns care this less about anything that's going on around them before or graze this close to the road with cars stopping to watch.

So we'll chalk this up as a good omen of things to come on our two-day trip here.

If you're planning on camping here overnight, which we highly recommend, getting here early in the day is key during the spring and fall.

There are only two campgrounds in the park and they are first come, first serve.

Our plan of rolling in at 4:30 in the afternoon even on a Monday meant finding a spot would be tough.

All right.

So I did the research on Valley of Fire.

Been here a couple of times before.

It says camping first come, first serve.

So a lot of people first came and were served and so we're not being served.

The Battle Van has no home as of right now.

So we're going to drive around.

We're going to head down towards Lake Mead to the shores of Lake Mead, see if there's a way to disperse camp or freedom camp down there in an area that doesn't have a, you know, improved campsite.

But right now, when we drove around through the campsites at, is it Atlat?

How do you say?

- [David] Atlatl.

- Atlatl Rock totally filled up.

So we decided to stop and get a couple of shots.

It's a real pretty sunset, muted pastel colors right now.

We're going to definitely come back here and shoot tomorrow sunset.

Hopefully the sky cooperates as good as it is right now, but we are still on the hunt for a campsite.

We may be sleeping outside the park tonight.

Film at 11.

Film.

Who says film at 11?

So on to plan B for camping tonight.

We flagged down a ranger in the park that told us there were good places to disperse camp in the Lake Mead National Recreation Area, just outside the park.

So with the sun already setting, we make our way to the rugged shores of Lake Mead to find a spot to camp for the night.

So we had to get out of the park at sunset because that's the rule.

And, but we did talk to a ranger and we said, "Ranger, where can we camp, disperse camp down by Lake Mead?"

Which is kind of off that direction out there.

And he goes, "Go outside the park and take a right and a left and look for a dirt road."

And so that's where we're at right now.

We have the Battle Van on a non-descriptive dirt road that we turned off.

- [Zack] Not on a map.

- Yeah, not really on a map.

It's super windy out here so I'm trying to find some wind protection right now.

All right.

So this is an old sign.

- [Dave] Looks like a lot of people ride horses out here.

- It says Fire Cove.

15 day limit.

- It says camping.

That's a camping site.

- Camping spot.

4x4 recommended.

All right, so-- So, uh-- Yeah, shoot that with the big camera, Zack.

Get a good shot of that.

- [David] What's the name of the cove?

- Fire Cove.

Just after the sign, the road dives into a wash as it winds its way toward Lake Mead.

About a half mile in, we find a good open spot with a cutbank that keeps us out of the sustained 20 mile an hour winds for the night and start to set up camp.

Boondocking into wild campsites like this is one of my favorite things to do and the Battle Van not only gets us in here, it's a great base camp to work from.

After camp is set, Zack breaks out his time-lapse gear and sets up for a few shots for later tonight.

The skies in the desert are famous for their stars, even though this location is still pretty close to the lights of Las Vegas seen in the distance.

(soft music) Morning in the desert is always a special time for photography.

The soft light and pastels of the sandscape combined with a quiet, yet noticeable reminder that this place is rugged and harsh and always deserves a certain level of respect.

After a little four wheeling on our way out, we make it back up to the main road and returned to Valley of Fire.

The first order of business is to secure a campsite.

The ranger tipped us off that turn around in the park is an everyday thing and the best time to grab a vacant spot is between 8:00 and 9:00 AM.

The campsites here are tucked into amazing sandstone features with plenty of great hiking right from your site.

And lucky for us, we find a perfect spot.

Pay the $20 a night fee and begin to unload gear before setting out to explore the park.

But not before we have to take care of a little medical emergency first.

First-aid kit.

We've got a little triage here, huh?

So one of our camping chairs bit David in the hand pretty good, apparently.

- In here admiring our campsite, telling Zack how cool it is.

- This is.

- While I'm unfolding the chair.

Those chairs are a little tricky.

Let's see, let's see what you got.

- Yeah, it's just not nothing too bad.

- I want to see the wound.

- It's just a little gouge.

It's just right in the web of the hand so everything that-- - Well, get some work on that.

- Yeah.

We'll just clean it, throw a bandaid on it.

We're good.

(gentle music) - As we move into the heart to Valley of Fire State Park, the scale of the sandstone formations and their unique shapes and colors add to the excitement of getting into the desert with cameras up.

The Aztec sandstone here was formed from shifting sand dunes 150 million years ago, after the Jurassic seas that filled this region subsided and the ocean floor rose.

Over millions of years, those sand dunes were covered by the gray and tan limestone mountains you see today.

But the forces of wind erosion over time have begun to reveal the dunes now compressed and solidified into the sandstone formations that decorate this unique landscape.

Valley of Fire State Park preserves 46,000 acres, just 50 miles north of Las Vegas and is Nevada's oldest state park, first opening in 1934.

The park has a handful of hiking trails, loops, and other notable features to check out.

But our favorite thing to do in places like this is to just jump out of the van near any open desert and wander into the landscape.

(gentle music) One of the great things about Valley of Fire State Park is there are great trails, but there's also some parking areas where you can pull off and then just kind of free hike through the desert.

It's one of my favorite things to do out here because you're pretty much assured not to be around any crowded trailheads or busy trails.

And you get that sort of raw natural experience out here that doesn't have the interp signs, it doesn't have a, you know, a meal train of folks walking by.

We're not even a quarter mile from where we parked the Battle Van and just walked a little bit into the desert here.

And it's beautiful.

You know, obviously the big wide vistas are what grab your eye first and you'd go to your camera.

You're like, Oh man, I got to grab that.

And we do and you grab that.

But it's stopping and looking at the little things when you get close to the sandstone, you know.

I'm kind of cuddled up next to this cool little sandstone ledge right here.

And to really study the rock and look at it and appreciate the time and the forces of nature that have shaped this landscape into what it is today is what I always find myself thinking about.

Cool little features like this.

Check out this little wind carved-- Let me see if I can get this here.

This little wind carved little arch here.

I'm taking the camera right now and just kind of backing it in and out of this really cool little arch feature here.

And the wind and it's just carved this over time.

Today we're kind of, we're kind of up against a wall.

A little bit on cloud cover.

So on a day like today, we've got a storm front moving in so the skies are a little opaque.

Sun's still kind of peeking through.

It's really muted the colors down big time.

And so, we don't have that vibrant red pop, but then you know what?

You also have this look that you don't normally see when you come here.

It's normally sunny here during the most of the days of the year.

So I'm having a good time exposing the camera.

I know Zack and David are having fun, you know, and are challenged with how to compose the right shot and using the exposure and the sun and the landscapes all to try to make something really cool looking.

So neat day.

We're going to head up to White Dome Trailhead next and take a good long walk into the desert and show you guys more of Valley of Fire State Park.

Moving further north along the park's Mouse Tanks Road, the red rock formations begin to mix with the lighter colored Navajo sandstone, more common in this area.

This road dead ends into a trailhead that gets its name for these features, as we get ready to hike the White Domes Loop Trail.

This is a popular mile and a quarter hike on a well-maintained trail through a series of giant sandstone formations that are stunning to walk beneath.

So we just left the trailhead for the White Domes hike, loop hike and right off the bat when you leave the trailhead, it's a pretty steep little dropdown here, but it's well-maintained, lots of natural steps and man-made steps to walk down.

The initial leg of the loop hike drops about 200 feet down a narrow trail.

And if it's busy, you'll need to be ready for some traffic control as you make your way down.

From below looking up, it's fascinating to think that what you're looking at are ancient sand dunes that formed after the ocean that was here 200 million years ago dried up.

It's a landscape that has not only been popular with park visitors, but with Hollywood as well.

Valley of Fire is often used as a filming location for movies, TV shows, and commercials.

Okay.

So we're a little further down the White Dome Trail right now and we've gotten to this interp sign and it talks about how this was Valley of Fire has been a popular place to film movies and TV commercials and stuff like that.

And you can tell.

It's awesome to film here.

That's why we're here.

Actually, the parking lot where we parked the Battle Van up there, it was the set of a movie, according to this sign called The Professionals in 1965.

The main movie set was built up in the parking lot area.

And they've also filmed movies like Star Trek Generations, Electric Horseman, and One Million B.C.

Pretty cool.

Dave, what are you thinking so far, man?

- Yeah, I don't know.

I don't know what this is.

- Well, I just read the sign over here.

It says this was, they filmed a lot of movies here back in the 60s and even up until like the 80s and 90s.

- Some westerns and stuff.

- Yeah.

It's kind of nice.

We had a little break in the action.

So what we're doing right now is we kind of slowed down.

We jumped off the parking lot with a bunch of people.

And so typically, when we get in these situations when we're filming, we'll just kind of let the crowd go ahead of us.

There's a group of people coming behind us up the trail now and we'll try to stay in this little neutral bubble right now so we can enjoy the park without so many folks around.

Not that we don't like people.

We like, we love people, but it's just so nice when you can just enjoy it without so many of them around.

Just below the old film set, the trail turns west and follows a creek bed into the highlight of the loop hike.

A place where water has carved a narrow slot canyon through the sandstone.

All right.

So this is going to be pretty neat.

This is going to be the highlight of the loop trail hike that we're on right now.

This is going to be the slot canyon.

Everybody loves a slot canyon.

Nobody more than me.

Actually Zack might.

Do you like slot canyons more than me, Zack?

- I think so.

I like-- Let's play the slots here.

- (laughs) We're going to play the slots here.

So anyway, we've got some folks up ahead of us.

We're letting them kind of enjoy it before you walk up on them.

Dave Boomer here, he's getting the shot ready.

If you can look ahead and see how narrow it is and a nice little, tight little slot.

It's always fun walking through them.

It's less fun if there's a flash flood coming down them, but that's why we keep track of the weather and make sure it's not raining somewhere upstream.

A little dry creek bed, which is part of the trail system here.

The trail actually is the creek bed in this little slot canyon and then it'll loop around the backside and we'll come back out at the parking lot on the top.

Messing up all your cool Instagram pictures, girls.

Sorry.

(laughs) You guys are awesome.

(girls laugh) This is awesome.

This is so cool.

All right.

Definitely a fun little slot hike.

Always favorite when you're in the desert.

Always puts a smile on my face, walking through these cracks in the sandstone.

Very cool.

And it's over.

The slot here is short compared to some we've hiked in at Zion National Park nearby.

But for me, slot canyons are kind of like pizza.

They're all pretty good.

The backside of the White Domes Loop Hike gradually climbs in elevation toward the trailhead and here the very colors of the sandstone really began to amaze.

The pastel yellows, purple, and red formations make this a tough trail to hike if you're a photographer because every 10 steps is another frame that has to be captured.

Valley of Fire State Park is best visited in winter, spring, and fall.

Summer temps here can easily go over 100 degrees, which can dramatically affect the fun factor on hikes like this.

There are no restaurants or services inside the park, but a gas station and convenience store right off Interstate 15, about 11 miles from the park entrance is a good place to load up on supplies if you need to.

(soft music) The only two campgrounds in the park are not only beautifully set up, but fun to explore around as well.

Some of my favorite footage from the entire park was taken on short walks right outside our campground.

It's also a nice chance to meet your neighbors and the guy camped next to us is someone we won't soon forget.

- I end up in places, camping in places, hiking and living in places that call to me and oftentimes I go through an area and I don't hear the call.

And then other times like this place and many others, they call so loud that you don't want to leave.

You need time and you need the lack of restrictions.

If you're worrying about home and or some other place or some other person, you're going to lose that contact that is really readily available for all of us.

I think you have to be in a place for quite a while to get to know it.

And one thing this year with COVID, I was restricted in movement and I didn't move and travel as much as I normally would and so I got more intimate with places that I had already known and I thought I was intimate with, but I got closer to them.

- This is the third time I've returned to Valley of Fire State Park so Brizz's words resonated with me.

There is a comfort and ease with exploring here that just feels right inside.

(crickets chirping) Night over Valley of Fire captured in time-lapse reveals another reason this park calls to each of us.

And sunrise draws us back into the red rock landscapes early once again.

But this time as we quietly shoot near our campsite and before most of our neighbors are awake, our friends, the desert bighorn sheep are back feeding just feet away from sleeping visitors.

Clearly unfazed by those crazy paint jobs usually found on rental camper vans.

Even our new friend, Brizz was up early to catch the rare up-close encounter with this group of bighorn sheep feeding in our camp.

- As I considered coming down here this winter and COVID and the restrictions and knowing what it was going to be like, I thought, Hmm, wonder how I'll do with that and I found out I did quite well, you know.

It just, it changed things a bit, changed them up.

And I think in some ways made them better.

I don't have much of a schedule and I'm truly grateful for that.

Certainly, visiting places that you've been to before and felt a bond or a love, you return to those places and it's like a friend.

(gentle upbeat music) - [Narrator] Outside Beyond The Lens, brought to you by Visit Fresno County.

Nature, diversity found in the heart of California's Central Valley.

Stay in Fresno or Clovis and drive to three nearby national parks.

By Hedrick's Chevrolet.

Supporting the spirit of travel in each of us.

Every journey has a first step.

Start your next adventure here.

By Fresno Yosemite International Airport.

Rediscover your love for travel with more options, more flights, more connecting you to the people and the places you love.

And by Visit Yosemite Madera County.

California's gateway to Yosemite National Park.

Explore the outdoor magic of Madera County and be inspired to discover more.

And by viewers like you.

(rocket blast off) (upbeat music)