Landscape

Dawn at Dream

When my friend Agastya Mishra and I started our hike at the Bear Lake trailhead in Colorado’s Rocky Mountain National Park in pitch darkness, we planned to be at the Dream or Emerald lakes at sunrise. However as we were about a third of our way, I noticed the first light glowing to the east a full 45 minutes before scheduled sunrise. Worried we may miss out on the alpenglow we were chasing, we decided to stop at Dream Lake instead of continuing on to Emerald lake.

At Dream Lake, I witnessed some of the most intense alpenglow I have ever seen. I will share the alpenglow image in a couple of days. Meanwhile, I want to share with you what I saw to the opposite side of where we were supposed to be shooting.

There was one local photographer already there and my friend Agastya set up his camera facing the Dream Lake and the Hallet peak in the background. In this picture, he would be behind my left shoulder The local photographer was set up behind my right shoulder here.In between the two of them was the Dream Lake. There was one way to get from one side to the other. I got there by walking on one of the logs that had fallen across the creek which drained Dream Lake into Nymph Lake down hill from us.

I knew I was going to be missing the best light on Hallet peak but the magical light that was causing the alpenglow was no less wondrous. So I turned my back to the best of the alpenglow and shot this scene instead, with the glowing embers of sunlight firing up the morning sky, lighting up the creek and dew covered vegetation all around. A few moments later I did photograph Hallet peak with Dream lake in front. For that, stay tuned.

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