A room with a view. Looking out my living room window at the Alaska range mountains as the day awakens in Fairbanks. Time of photo: 9:11am (see-it is not really dark all day up here) We are only a few weeks away from winter solstice, Decmeber 21, the darkest day of the year.
The pre-sunrise light in Fairbanks this morning was of a particular brilliance. Some fear the thought of a residence in this reputedly dark winter region of the northern hemisphere. The former two adjectives are somewhat accurate, but mostly in that they serve to keep the general population growth in check. In my opinion, they are both over-rated, in a negative way. The cold is not difficult to deal with (of course opinions vary on this), and the darkness, is augmented by a sunrise process that looks like this picture, and it lasts a few hours, constantly changing. Its a complete intrigue to watch, and facilitates the opening of any given day in a slow and gentle manner. This is a welcomed season for me following the buzzing and light-laden summer, that seems to prompt perpetual motion.
Now if I wasn’t enjoying watching the sunrise so much, I would be outside photographing it. The view is from my living room window, looking south to the Alaska range mountains that separate interior Alaska from the South central region. My office has a similar view, however computer monitor control does not permit our windows shades to be open. And speaking of computer monitors, the last step in my recent computer upgrade to windows 7 with two 30″ dell monitors, was the calibration of these giant light emitting objects. It went surprising smooth and successful, and I’ll comment on that in an upcoming post.
The Alaska range mountains, from the right: Hayes, Deborah and Hess, the latter two peaks are slightly behind the birch trees.
After I made this post, I thought I would add another grab shot when the sun was just cresting the mountains at 10:53am., One hour and 40 minutes after the first shot.
Another photo taken as the sun crested the mountains, 10:53am.
