Trees, Rocky Ridge, Sunset. © Copyright 2021 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.
Wildfire smoke turns the sunset deep red on a rock and tree covered Yosemite wilderness ridge.
Every so often the sky coughs up some light that is almost unbelievable, and I feel obligated to say that, yes, this really did happen… and perhaps offer an explanation. In this case the story is a combination of location Every so often the sky coughs up some unbelievable light, and I feel obligated to say that, yes, this really did happen… and perhaps offer an explanation. In this case the story is a combination of location and conditions. This granite dome-like ridge is located in the Yosemite backcountry overlooking a large canyon and with an unobstructed view to the western horizon. That distant horizon is across the Great Central Valley and marked by the Coast Range. Because the ridge is high the line to the sun right at sunset goes though a lot of atmosphere, which tends to soften and warm the light. On top of that, this was the season of widespread wildfire smoke, and that added to the bloody red color of the light on this ridge.
I had been out on an evening walk away from camp that took me up to a high point on the ridge behind this camera position. I made photographs up there and then started to walk along the backbone of the ridge that would take me back to camp. As I came around to this section that is open to the west, the color of the light was just about as intense as it gets. I dropped my camera bag, popped up my tripod, and made a few exposures during the last moments before the sun dropped below the horizon.
G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.
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Indeed, it does “get late early” at this time of year. Not sure I’ll get to do it this year, but in the past I have backpacked up to the middle of October. It is a beautiful time to be in the Sierra… but those hours of darkness are long!
You can almost feel the warmth!
I hurriedly scanned your description because the phone rang, and at first I thought you said you tripped instead of tripod …I would trip trying to get this photographed quickly! Like Yogi Berra said about late summer/early autumn: “It gets late early”!!