Something about the geography of our valley makes the summertime pop-up storms avoid us, for the most part. Arches, to the west, and the La Sal Mountains to the east seem to get 80% of the action.
While we could use the water, I can’t complain about the view…
There’s a particular glow the valley gets when there’s a rainbow. It’s hard to describe, but I can always tell there’ll be a rainbow when I look outside while the light looks a certain way.
It’s like half the valley is lit by spotlights, and those bright objects are set against a dark sky. Very dramatic.
This morning, after being battered by wind all night, I woke up to see a strong line of storms coming our way. I started working at my computer before the sun rose, but at some point after sunrise, I looked up and saw that glow.
Here’s what I found stretching over the valley:
Amazing.
You can kind of see the glow I’m talking about but, like the rainbow, it’s much clearer in person.
This is the first rainbow I’ve really seen in the morning, and it was so… intense. Hard to capture, but my phone has a pretty decent camera. Here are some more pics from this morning:
On Friday, 9-23, the first cold front of the season blew through the west. Just a days after the Equinox there is snow on the La Sal mountains, as if Winter can’t wait to arrive.
Yesterday I drove to Grand Junction, along scenic highway 128 from Castle Valley, past Dewey, and through Cisco. The views were spectacular. Well, the views are always spectacular, but the red rock set against clouds and well-defined storm cells was extra special.
I pulled over several times to take a pic.
Like all photos of dark skies and sweeping scenic views, the picture does no justice to what the eyes see.
Still, it translates well enough, and I really love what the pictures show.
Enjoy!
The storms on radar:
Approaching storm 1:
Storm 1 and Fisher Towers:
Looking back after driving through the northwestern corner of storm 1:
Final pic–looking back at the edge of storm 1 from Cisco, UT:
Driving toward storm 2:
Dramatic clouds looking toward storm 1:
When I arrived in Grand Junction, the storms had split and gone around the city, but the sky and the sunset were pretty spectacular. Here’s a shot from the parking lot. No filters here, it really looked this apocalyptic.
On Feb 29th, 2016 I was running some errands in Moab, UT (last minute getting the car registered before it expires–no surprises there for Last Minute Markey).
As I was leaving the nursery in Moab–picking up some wonderful herbs to plant in the backyard, I saw the wind kicking up dust. I watched for a minute and it looked like it was getting more and more organized. I grabbed my phone and started to recording. I was too worried about missing a moment of filming, I forgot to not film vertically, like a dope.
Oh well.
The video is still pretty awesome. This thing goes from an interesting to swirl of dust to a tightly organize funnel in a matter of seconds. Very cool to watch the formation and dissipation.
Watch it on full screen. It’s amazing.