Sometimes, with a little planning and a whole lot of luck, thiings work out. One late evening, my friend and fellow photographer Bill Gladish and I parked the car in the Clingman's Dome parking lot in Great Smoky Mountains National Park and hiked the 1.8 miles to Andrew's Bald, hoping to find an open vantage point, far from the milling crowds, where we could concentrate on photography. To explain, there are a number of "balds" in the region, which are (relatively) treeless mountaintops, and there are a number of theories as to how they came to be that way. Andrew's Bald turned out to be less bald than we had hoped, but it did offer a few inspiring views, such as the one in this image.

When we arrived, the sky was rather heavily overcast, but there were some breaks in the clouds, enough to keep us hopeful. While Bill was photographing birds and enjoying the views, I searched for the "perfect" spot to get a landscape photo, which happened to be accessible only by shoving my back firmly into a bush.

As the sun approached the horizon, it dropped below a band of clouds and cast a brilliant golden glow across this scene. As conditions were rapidly changing, I made several series of shots in close succession, each series consisting of four or five shots at different angles, which I stitched together in post-processing (the second series was the winner).

By the time Bill and I had enjoyed the waning sunset and packed up our gear, it had become quite dark, so we enjoyed our trek back to the car by flashlight, under the stars. Sadly, Bill died just eight years after I made this photo, so it remains a vivid reminder of his positive spirit and the good times we spent together.