Tag Archives: sunset

Smoke and Fog

Posted on February 7, 2006 by Kelson

Monday morning dawned foggy. By the time we left for work, most of the fog had burned off, but we looked out the car window and saw a huge, billowing gray cloud hugging close to the ground. If this had been the usual fire season, or if there had been no fog to start with (or if there had been time for coffee to take effect), I think we would’ve both immediately recognized it as smoke from a brush fire. The Sierra fire in the Cleveland National Forest had started just a few hours earlier.

Sierra Fire Smoke on Monday morning, blending into fog

There was still fog around, though. Continue reading →

Posted in Photos | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Sunrise, Sunset

Posted on January 29, 2006 by Kelson

Backlit Morning Clouds Freeway Sunset 1

The first photo is from Wednesday morning around 8:00. Katie took it on our drive to work. There’s actually another shot that shows more of the sky, but this one is more striking. The second shows tonight’s sunset as seen from the Metro Pointe parking lot. Yes, it’s a freeway in the foreground, but the sunset itself was incredible. Both thumbnails are linked to larger copies of the photos.

Finally, here are some vaguely lenticularish clouds I saw looking north at sunset on Friday. This one’s full-size already:

Lenticular Clouds on the Horizon

Posted in Photos | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

That Belt of Venus Thing

Posted on September 27, 2005 by Kelson

About a month ago I posted about noticing the Belt of Venus—the red band that circles the entire horizon just after sunset—and the Earth’s shadow on the sky. I snapped this picture on the drive home this evening. This is looking east, away from the setting sun.

Looking east toward Saddleback at sunset.

If you look at the right edge of the picture, behind the silhouette of the tree, you can just see the red band fading into the dark gray of the Earth’s shadow.

(And to think, I almost brought the good camera with me this morning… Update: It turns out that I did bring it, and just didn’t realize it was there. Oh, well.)

Posted in Photos, Space | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Feathered Sunset

Posted on September 18, 2005 by Kelson

Here’s a picture of last Wednesday’s sunset (September 14) as seen from the 405 in Irvine.

Sunset with clouds (and monolith!)

The photo links to a larger copy.

And no, I wasn’t trying to get the “monolith” in there. I don’t remember exactly where this was, so I’m not even sure what the sign is for.

Posted in Photos | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Look, up in the sky!

Posted on August 20, 2005 by Kelson

A few nights ago I was walking around sunset, and decided to look for something that had been mentioned last week on the Astronomy Picture of the Day: the Belt of Venus.

Somehow I’d never noticed that after sunset, the band of red encircles the entire sky at the horizon. Even more amazing, if you look away from the sun you can actually see the Earth’s shadow on the sky as a slightly darker blue below the pink. It reminded me of the view of Mauna Kea’s shadow on the cloud layer below. Oddly, though I didn’t pay any attention to it at the time, the Belt of Venus is clearly visible in that photo!

I guess at sunset I’m most likely to be looking at, well, the sunset. Or focusing on whatever it is I’m doing at the time.

This was Thursday night, so the moon was almost full. It rose just below the Belt of Venus, just inside the shadow. So close to the horizon, the moon illusion was in full effect, and it looked huge!

And me without my camera. *sigh*

Posted in Life, Space | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Mauna Kea

Posted on May 2, 2005 by Kelson

And now for something completely different: Hawaiian snow. On our second-to-last day in Hawaii, we took a tour up to the summit of Mauna Kea, the highest mountain in the state at 13,796 feet. And even in early April, they still had snow at the summit.

Hawaiian Snow

We caught a somewhat hazy view of it from the west, in the Kohala area, but our best view of the mountain actually came the day after the tour, on our drive out to Akaka Falls. We’re probably due east of the mountain here:

Mauna Kea seen from the road to Akaka Falls

Continue reading →

Posted in Hawaii 2005, Photos, Space, Travel | Tagged , , , , , | 7 Comments