Yosemite Valley Chapel, Yosemite National Park, California – United States

Picture a little wooden chapel on Christmas Eve, its doors beautifully adorned with sweet-smelling fir wreaths and its roof sprinkled with just the right amount of spun sugar snow. It’s surrounded by stately, perfectly shaped firs, also dusted with crisp, clean snowfall. In the background, the tree-covered, craggy mountains of the Yosemite Valley rise and reach toward a perfect ice-blue winter sky.

That’s how Yosemite Valley Chapel looked the day White Fir was taken. It was early in the morning on Christmas Eve. The crisp mountain air was clean, bright, and strangely comforting, like cool, freshly laundered linen. The smell of evergreen boughs permeated the air. The freshly fallen snow crunched and squeaked underneath my feet. Standing in front of the chapel on such a magical day was exactly like stepping straight into the most perfect of holiday cards – a flawless moment in a perfect place, crystallized and preserved forever.