No Hands Bridge

No Hands bridge in Auburn, CA, an iconic landmark in Placer County along the North Fork American River. 

This was a photo I had been trying to get for months. Shortly after I started trying, a construction team came in and started working on taking out the old, collapsed hwy 49 bridge that had been sitting at the bottom of the river for decades. A good thing, but that unfortunately caused a big, long, yellow buoy to be placed along the shore of the river that got in the way of the shot. So I put it off for a few months and waited for them to finish. 

Once November rolled around, we started to get a lot of good clouds and sunsets, so I thought it was time to try again, making this my fourth attempt. The construction work was projected to be done by the end of the year, so I hoped I had waited long enough. I made the short drive over, crossed over the bridge, and saw that the workers were still there, but the yellow buoy was gone. Hooray! I walked over, found my spot on a large rock overlooking the river and waited for the sun to set. I even got a little show, seeing the people working below me take a few big chunks of the old bridge out of the water. 

The clouds were looking dark, and I wasn't sure if it was going to get any color, but then all of a sudden there was this big yellow, orange strip of color that burst in the sky, and the way it reflected off of the water made it look like it was shooting out of the rock below me. I even got a little fall color from the brush along the river. I had finally gotten my shot of this iconic bridge, but not without obstacles and trial and error. Sometimes it's the challenges that need to be overcome that make something more special and meaningful. This was nothing short of that.