Balcony House

Author's Comments

The first time I went up the ladder I was thinking about my camera and not about the canyon, and that was a mistake. The thirty-two feet of ascent is the whole point of the approach. You come up out of Soda Canyon and into the alcove the way the people who built this place came up, and the canyon falls away behind you in a long south-facing sweep that catches morning light better than almost anywhere else in the park. I prefer late spring for Balcony House. The cottonwoods at the canyon bottom are still pale green, the air is cleaner than it will be in August, and the alcove itself stays cool well past breakfast. Morning is the only time worth photographing here. The sandstone above the dwelling glows for maybe an hour after sunrise, warm and almost orange, and the rooms below sit in deep shadow that holds detail if you expose patiently. Wait for that contrast. It is the photograph. The wide shot from the balcony itself is the obvious composition and worth making, but I have come to prefer the detail work - the way mortar lines run across the masonry, the small T-shaped doorways, the particular weathering on the timber that has been there for eight centuries. A medium telephoto handles this better than the wide lens most people bring. Tickets sell out. Book ahead. And know that the crawl-through tunnel on the exit is not a place for a camera around your neck. I pack mine away for that section every time, and every time I am glad I did.

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