Story behind the shot: Lost Coast

Photo by author

In this series, we dig a little deeper into the photographic process behind some of the coolest shots we’ve seen.

Photographer: Joshua Thaisen

After a six-hour drive north of San Francisco on the 101, my partner Brianna and I arrived at the southern trailhead to attempt a double traverse of the Lost Coast Trail. This photo of Bri was taken a couple of miles south of Rattlesnake Ridge, right after sunrise on our fifth morning in the wilderness. We were on the home stretch of the trail — an eight-mile race against the incoming tide to get through a dangerous high-tide impasse notorious for washing slow hikers out to sea.