There’s just something about the sky. Okay, maybe that’s a pretty typical comment from me, so maybe I’d better rephrase it. There’s just something about the sky in winter. That may seem like a strange statement from someone who occasionally fantasizes about being a storm chaser, but there’s a reason to my madness. In the winter, the sky is unusually clear. There is no haze from the summer heat. The high altitude clouds are brilliantly reflective, often iridescent. In winter, it is all too easily possible to be overwhelmed by the sheer light of the heavens.
One reason why I find this cold, clear lucidness of the winter skies so attractive is because, since I was about 4 years old, I have cherished the dream of someday traveling up to the Alaskan wilderness. If you’ve ever seen pictures of the Alaskan wilderness, particularly near the Arctic Circle, you may have noticed that the sky, for the most part devoid of clouds, is clear, brilliant and awash with a rainbow of colors. I’ve often longed to see the Aurora Borealis with my own eyes, to see at night the stars hanging so big and bright over the unnamed mountains that I could simply reach out and touch them… well, anyway, winter in Texas is the only time I get to see anything remotely like that.
I took this picture when the last cold front swept in. The wind was very strong and bitter, so I was leaning against our 15 passenger van in an effort to get away from the biting cold. The cirrus clouds in this picture were moving so fast that the clouds on the left of the picture came clean past the moon in a matter of about five minutes. It was astonishing. One very common misconception is to think that cirrus clouds (and other high altitude clouds like them) simply hang motionless in the air, miles above the ground. You’d be surprise, if you really pay attention, how fast these clouds can move when they’ve a mind to! Incidentally, this picture was taken facing the southeast.
This is looking to the northwest, almost directly overhead.
And this is looking to the southwest about 10 minutes later. Most of these clouds are alto stratus.
I took these pictures this morning.
Tonight, I tried, with the aid of my dad’s tripod, to take a few astronomy pictures. To my consternation, only two of the pictures turned out, so I guess I still have some work to do. This star is on the right shoulder of Orion, and is a red super giant named Betelgeuse (pronounced Beetle Juice).
Here’s the whole constellation. Betelgeuse is the red dot on the left. The bright blue-white dot on the right is Rigel.
Better try next time, I suppose. Or, perhaps, I just need to take a trip to Alaska.
