Tree Silhouette At Sunrise

Balsam Fir and sunrise (final)
Balsam Fir and sunrise (final)

At 4:30am, I hiked out to the coastal headlands and arrived at White Head shortly before sunrise.  Although the weather was hazy, the pre-dawn light in the sky was interesting and beautiful.  As the sun rose to the horizon, the colors begain to fade and I believed the show was over, so abandoned my perch atop the cliff, 160 feet above the sea, and hiked north along the coast.

Fifteen minutes later, I spied this oddly shaped tree atop an exposed cliff and made the image shown here, a silhouette against a grey sky.

Balsam Fir silhouette
Balsam Fir silhouette

The hike to the north had brought me down to sea level and the cliffs now loomed above me. Unexpectedly, just to the left of the tree, the sun was beginning to rise behind the cliff.  The show wasn’t over yet.  The time was almost 6 a.m.

Scrambling along the coastal rocks, I positioned myself such that the tree was in front of the rising sun.  The second shot here is 15 minutes after the grey-sky shot.  Then, the final image is an additional 5 minutes later, about 6:20 a.m.

Balsam Fir and sunrise
Balsam Fir and sunrise