BELL ROCK AND COURTHOUSE BUTTE, SEDONA, ARIZONA
by Michelle Bienias
 What: Bell Rock and Courthouse Butte
Bell Rock (on the left) and Courthouse Butte are popular hiking destinations. The bell-shaped monolith is a Sedona landmark and also one of four so-called vortexes, which some believe exert spiritual energy while others view them as a pseudo-scientific invention of New Agers. Courthouse Butte can be seen from almost anywhere in Sedona and looks like the profile of a human face gazing upwards from its top horizon.
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Where: A few miles south of Sedona, Arizona, just off the I79 on the way to the Village of Oak Creek.Who: Photographer G. Donald Bain of Bain Digital Graphics and Director of the Geography Computing Facility at the University of California Berkeley. When: Week of IQTVRA Summit in Sedona, Oct 25-29, 2004.Why: “When we arrived in Sedona on Sunday it was beautiful and sunny, the way Arizona should be,” Don writes. “Since our hotel room was not ready we drove up the road a mile or so to a parking lot for trails leading into the Red Rocks Scenic Area and took a short hike. “This shows the typical vegetation of the higher deserts of Arizona: pinyon pines, junipers, and a few small cacti. The rock is typical of the Colorado Plateau, horizontal strata of bright red sandstone, which begins here and extends north and east for hundreds of miles through the Four Corners area. “Little did we know at this point that the weather was about to change. It rained almost all week, very heavily at times, and with snow on the top of the buttes. It wasn't until the next Friday that there was blue sky again.” How: Taken with an Olympus E-1 digital SLR, 14-104mm 2.8 lens at 14mm (equivalent to 28mm), f.11 at 1/250 second. Mounted on a Kaidan QuickPan III Pro. Stitched with Apple QuickTime VR Authoring Studio.
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