Story by Sandy Lang
“It’s kind of amazing when you sit quietly in the morning,” says Laurie Metzger, who likes to wake early enough to be on her dock on Lake Keowee before the sun rises. “I walk down to the dock with my coffee and my dog, and I watch these amazing sunrises.”
She and her husband built their home on the water with a wide southeastern view, so she has an especially good vantage point for observing—a lone fisherman, scullers rowing, a heron fishing, otters, beavers, and foxes.
The scenery at The Cliffs at Keowee Falls captivates Metzger, who notes that there’s an especially beautiful quality to the light on the lake happening about thirty minutes before full daylight. She started bringing her camera to the dock to try to capture it. From the first image, she was hooked. Before shifting her focus to parenting during her son’s and daughter’s childhood, Metzger worked in banking and then as an industrial photographer and a portrait photographer. The lake images were her first foray into landscape and waterscape photography.
Metzger photographed Lake Keowee pre-dawn on more than 450 days during the pandemic. In those unusual times, it was a way “to try to find the beauty in the world,” she recalls. And she shared her photography, posting daily images to social media. That led to sales and gallery showings—she’s now a member of the Art Gallery on Pendleton Square. Her passion for photography continues, and she says local hikes are a source of inspiration. Metzger is a co-leader of a hiking group at Keowee Falls, with outings on Tuesdays from fall to spring. Through these hikes, she’s discovered other locations for her early-morning photography.
“I’ll get up before dawn and head to a location and wait for the sun to come up,” she explains. Several of her favorite spots are along hiking trails that she can walk to from home. Or she’ll drive to an overlook on the way to Cashiers, toward Sassafras Mountain, Pretty Place, or Table Rock. Once her Sony camera is securely on the tripod and she’s framed the shot, she says she’ll typically leave the shutter open for long exposures—five to twenty seconds. “That really enriches the colors, and if there’s water, it makes the surface glass-like.”
Metzger says she’s regularly scanning the horizon for photo subjects. “I keep my camera in my car,” she notes, recalling a recent drive when she stopped at a cotton field and photographed the rows. “I probably hung out for a half hour.”
She prefers to print the images in larger sizes, typically ranging from 30×45 up to six feet wide. Most are purchased by individuals for their walls at home, but she donates work to the Cliffs Residents Outreach annual auction and has a photograph hanging in the Keowee Falls Clubhouse. The subject of that print is the view from Pounding Mill Overlook on the Blue Ridge Parkway. Metzger says she arrived that day to “a low-lying fog, so it’s a very ethereal scene.” And she captured it during those magical minutes she loves, just before sunrise.
This story was featured in Cliffs Living magazine. To see more stories like this one and learn more about The Cliffs, subscribe here.
