All week I was gearing up to head for the mountains on Saturday, but forecasted 60+ mph wind gusts just didn’t sound all that appealing. So, I decided to stay low again.

I couldn’t make up my mind what to do. I had some ideas, but the snow conditions weren’t what I wanted for those particular ideas.

My alarm went off in the morning and I was still undecided. I made my coffee, grabbed my stuff and decided to head for my usual plan B, Green Mountain and Flagstaff.

I got pretty excited looking at the sky as I threw my stuff in the car. It was clear over the Boulder mountains, but blanketed to the east for a potentially nice sunrise. I was figuring I gave myself just enough time to hike up somewhere to get some great shots to the east. But, guess who forgot about the road closure on Baseline……again! And, didn’t plan enough time for the detour!

On to an extremely last minute plan C, NCAR. Luckily, I already had a spot in mind for a sunrise photo session. I just wasn’t sure I was going to beat the sun to it.

After all the years of living in Boulder, it still amazes me how NCAR is in its own weather bubble. As I was driving up the hill, the snow was blowing across the road so hard it wasn’t even drifting on the road, just blowing across it. Maybe I should’ve just gone to the mountains…..

I parked, put my boots on, grabbed my pack, put my head down and headed out into the wind. The blowing snow filled in the trail making it hard to see the rocks in the early dawn light. My toes can still feel every rock I kicked.

I made it to my spot which luckily sits down just enough to allow me to set up my tripod out of the direct wind. And, just in time for the clouds to start lighting up. I found my settings and decided to do a pano. I stitched three images together to make this pano of the warm clouds blanketing frozen Boulder. (Click on the photo to make it bigger)

Sunrise photography of a blanket of clouds over a snowy boulder, colorado, pano

As I was hiking to this spot and the cold wind was blasting me with icy snow, I wasn’t sure how long I was going to stick around, but once the magic started happening, I was in it until the end.

winter sunrise photography over boulder, colorado, snowy landscape, blanket of pink and purple clouds, landscape photography

sunrise photography as the sun just starts to peak over the horizon, taken from NCAR

sunrise photography as the sun just comes over the horizon creating a sun star, boulder, colorado

winter sunrise over boulder, colorado as the sun creates a sun star over the snow covered landscape

It’s mornings like this that make it worth dragging myself out of bed in the dark cold hours of winter.

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Boulder Sunrise Session