Thinking About a Sense of Place

When I am planning, or maybe it is actually daydreaming, about a vacation that will take me to a new locale, I start to think about how I might capture the essence of the destination in my photographs. By definition, visiting a new destination requires that I do some research about the geography, the people and their customs, the history, and whatever else I can learn. I'm beginning to do the research for the trip to Peru. It is many months away, but part of the experience begins right now for me. I'm starting to think about how to capture the sense of place even before I get to that place.

The image above was captured in Utah at Arches National Park. It is vast, it is desolate, and storms roll in with some frequency in the warmer months.