Not too long ago I went out to Guadalupe River State Park for the Statesman. The story was about swimming holes and how they’re disappearing in the drought.
I woke up early and drove about an hour and a half out to the park. When I got there, I peaked down in to the valley where the river was and was surprised to see that it was flowing, though it was extremely shallow in some parts.
No one was swimming when I arrived, but before too long, a group of three boys came walking around the corner with their mothers. I asked if they were planning on swimming and they said yes, then I asked if I could tag along and take some pictures while they swam. They all agreed.
I stayed on shore for a while as the boys tried to find the deepest spot to swim. Their moms stayed out of the water and asked me not to photograph them, so I focused on the boys.
After a few minutes, they got tired of swimming and began to explore the riverbed. At this point, I knew standing on shore wasn’t going to cut it, so I ventured in to knee deep water and tried to keep up.
I was enjoying the shoot, but at the back of my mind, I knew I still needed an image that showed how low the water was. I debated leaving the boys to find another situation, then one of them started to collect rocks from the bottom of the river.
These shots seemed to fit the bill a little better and I was happy with them.
We moved pretty far up river from where I parked, so I had to walk a while to get back. On the way I saw another trio, this time two woman and one man. I got some shots from far away and then got a little closer. The man was laying in the middle of the river in a place that is normally about 5 feet deep. It seemed like the perfect photo to go with the story, so I did my best to capture it. (That’s the photo at the top.)
It was starting to get later in the morning, so I took a tip from a swimmer (I shot more than just the three boys and the man at the top) and explored down river a bit. Unfortunately, that situation didn’t pan out. It got increasingly more difficult to walk along the water as cliffs got steeper and it wasn’t too long before it was apparent that walking further would take some climbing gear, so I turned back.
I tried a few other situations, but the park was almost empty other than the small swimming area. So I headed home to edit. It was nice to see people swimming, despite the record breaking drought. Plus, I can’t complain when I’m assigned to go to a state park to capture people having fun!