I spent a night camping and woke up before sunrise near Mono Lake — an ancient body of water over a million years old, and one of the oldest in North America.

I was hoping to capture the sunrise colors over the tufa towers. They are limestone spires formed centuries ago that rose above the water line as the lake levels dropped over time. They now stand like natural pillars across the landscape.

The sky was still dark when I arrived at the entrance of the Natural Reserve, and I quickly realized I’d have to do a bit of scrambling. It was my first time there, so I needed to find a strong composition in the dim pre-dawn light.

After a first successful shot of pink clouds over the tufas, I figured I would try something different.

Mono Lake is also home to millions of migratory birds, and I wanted to try to include some of them in the frame behind the tufa formations.

I was happy with the results and grateful for such a peaceful morning surrounded by incredible scenery.

I packed up my gear and began hiking back to the car. As I rounded a corner, I walked straight into a photoshoot — the naked kind.

Two women were standing in the water, completely nude. Another one was posing on top of a tufa tower. From what I could tell, it was a fine art nude photography session.

Not the kind of wild-life encounter I expected that morning.

Apart from needlessly damaging century-old, fragile rock formations, a more important question came to mind:

Is climbing and posing on a tufa ?