Antelope Canyon

[LenR]

Photo tours to this canyon in Arizona to be terminated. Over exploited sadly.

https://petapixel.com/2019/12/11/ant...ative-reviews/

[Antonio Correia]

Too many people...

I think sites like this one and others should have their visitors number limited to avoid damage, vandalism and so on.
Look for example Taj Mahal. Even arriving at 5 in the morning the crowd is huge already and inside one can't appreciate que space. Fortunately I have visited it 15 years ago.

[Shadowman]

Not a total loss to photographers or tourists, just for booked photo tours, seems there was quite a bit of negativity from tour participants against the guides, seems those with point and shoot cameras were ejected from booked tours and also participants complained about the cramped conditions of the caves and slight damage to their gear. As someone who did a similar caving tour the conditions can be uncomfortable and not the best place to change lenses.

[LenR]

Antonio, agreed. Social media can also be a "curse" in increasing visitation to fragile sites world wide.
There are locations in the Rocky Mountains here in Canada that 20 odd years ago were easily accessible. Now tourist traps!

[LePetomane]

I never go to Yellowstone or Grand Teton National parks expecting to get a great shot because of all of the people. Last year at the Grand Prismatic I almost got in a fight with a guy from a tour bus. All of the space on the boardwalks he wanted to be where I had set up my tripod.

[rpcrowe]

Antelope Canyon had been on my bucket list until I learned of the overcrowded conditions... I then scratched it off my list...

Yosemite is another location in which the numbers of people far exceed the capacity of the place. If you visit there early in the season (right after the snow melts) the crowds are still fairly thin but, from June, on it is a nightmare.

Even before maximum crowds, people can ruin the atmosphere. I visited there in mid-May and saw a group of people with P&S cameras chasing a Mama bear and her two cubs across this meadow...



Luckily for the dumb tourists (and for mama bear) the tourists did not get between mom and her cubs. Even a black bear can be pretty dangerous if her kiddies are threatened... If she mauled the tourists, I don't know what would have happened to her...

[LenR]

Paul, second your thoughts on Grand Tetons. Visited in the fall several years ago. Sunrise locations such as Mormons Row and Oxbow Bend were packed shoulder to shoulder and those were just the photographers!

[LePetomane]

Richard, another animal not to mess with when she has the little ones around is a moose.

Len, I know what you mean about GTNP. We were there last fall. There was a string of cars from the town of Moose, through Jackson and into Teton Village. Very busy. Your national parks, Banff and Jasper see a lot of people, too. When we would visit my wife's family in Edmonton we would make the rounds. Then we wised up and hit the smaller parks, Yoho and Kootenay. Beautiful scenery without the crowds.

[LenR]

Paul. I see you are familiar with our mountain parks. Even though they are in my "back yard" so to speak I seldom go up any more. Banff particularly has become incredibly popular with tourists to the point that in many of the iconic attractions you cannot move for people. This coupled with the $20/$25 a day entrance fee just puts me off.
Len.