alpenglow

It’s the last Saturday morning of January and I’m on my default setting: standing by my tripod, somewhere in Rocky Mountain National Park, waiting for sunrise. In this instance, I’m perched on a hillside below the Gem Lake Trail, marveling at the view of Longs Peak across the way… and please please please let there be some alpenglow along with the dawn’s early light.

I’ll let John Fielder (one of my favorite landscape photographers) explain alpenglow… In his book Mountain Ranges of Colorado, he says: “Of course, sunrise makes for the best photography, especially on clear days when the sun breaks the horizon at a very low angle over the Great Plains. Thanks to a property of physics that causes the Earth’s atmosphere to absorb, or make invisible, the ‘cool’ colors (blue, green, violet) in the spectrum of light, this low-lying sun turns peaks red.”

This phenomenon lasts only moments, but to view it in person here in the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado is a wondrous, breathtaking experience. Well worth the rolling out of bed at an ungodly hour, the drive in the pre-dawn darkness, the hike by headlamp to just the right spot, and the waiting for sunrise on a cold hillside once you’ve arrived at just the right spot. As the light begins to paint the peaks, you can't help but think that life is very good indeed.

Thanks for reading about stuff I’ve photographed. ~Rich