I wasn’t even thinking about trying to shoot the sunset when I was driving home last week.  The sky conditions were clear and it didn’t look like much would be happening.  I concentrated all my attention on shooting the moonrise as I was deep in a canyon and it was making a spectacular appearance over the ridge above me.

When I was finished with the moon, I turned around and started walking back to the car – and then stopped dead in my tracks as I saw the most unique sunset I have ever witnessed unfolding in front of me.  After saying “Wow!” to the empty space around me, I got busy with the camera.

Small clouds were hitting the mountain in front of me and were being driven up into the sky where they would come apart in a wispy mess.  I thought it looked like a cotton candy forest fire, and the color of the clouds reminded me of a coral/pastel Polo shirt I owned in the late 80’s when Miami Vice was at the pinnacle of pop culture.

It was as if the hookah-smoking caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland was sitting behind the mountain casually blowing psychedelic patterns into the air.

That was ten minutes of totally awesome.