The Importance of Perseverance

Glen Haven is one of my favorite photography locations in the area, but for most of the time when I was out there a couple days ago, I was sure I was in for a disappointment. Many people decide to go with their gut feeling and their gut feeling is usually surprisingly accurate. I'm not one of those people; my gut feeling is almost always dead wrong. I'd be terrible at casinos. So I probably shouldn't have been surprised that my hike went way better than I expected it to.

For the most part, is was one of those perfectly cloudless days that are great for the beach, but not as much fun for taking pictures. However, the weather report did give me some hope that there would be some clouds later on in the day. The ideal conditions for sunset photography (according to conventional wisdom) are scattered clouds, but not directly on the horizon, so that the sun is still visible. When I got there, I realized that I was in luck for the first part, but less so for the second; the only clouds were right where the sun was setting. Since this meant no interesting light and no orange sun pictures, I wasn't feeling terribly optimistic.

I've been trying for years to figure out how to get a good picture of these cool dead trees. I don't know if this is it.

However, I didn't drive across the county for nothing, so I decided to get creative; I've been wanting to do more panoramas, so I decided to do some of those, taking advantage of the sliver of purple on the horizon.

A 360º panorama over the dunes.

The same panorama, except this time made into a planet. I love doing this.

 After the sun set, the colors got a little better, though still not spectacular (seen above) On a whim, I decided to go down to the beach, to do some long exposures. What I wasn't anticipating...

And then BOOM.

 Through some atmospheric phenomenon, the sky practically exploded in a brief display of cotton candy pinks... It didn't last very long, but it was worth every second of hiking across the dunes and complaining about clouds. Even worth the two small sand dunes that accumulated in my shoes and then turned to mud as soon as I dared to step near the water. There are worse ways to end one's day.