Amazing sunrise on Sprague Lake

The following images are from a trip to Rocky Mountain National Park back in January. I was planning to hike up to one of the high mountain lakes from Bear Lake trailhead, but when I got to the trailhead early before sunrise it was blowing snow really hard up there and was dastardly cold. Not conditions in which you want to hike for a few hours and not get anything worthwhile. I waited for an hour or so drinking my coffee and eating some sandwiches to see whether the weather would let up. But it didn't and I decided to go back down. The clouds that the snow was dumping out were really only hanging on the peaks around the basin and going down I noticed that it was relatively clear around Sprague lake. Sprague Lake is a popular very short trail that you can hike around with kids and be back before the whining starts. In winter it offers nice views of the basin. I hiked up the lake and found a great position and some interesting structures in the snow and the sunrise was spectacular. These images are taken away from the basin that kept being shrouded in clouds.


Symmetry. Buy a print. Also on flickr.
Assembled from 9 images (3 rows of 3) at 50mm, ISO 200, f/16, 1/20s


The wave. Horizontal crop of the above image. Buy a print.


Blobs. Buy a print.
Assembled from 9 images (3 rows of 3) at 50mm, ISO 200, f/16, 1/20s


Red dawn. A little later the colors changed. Buy a print.
Assembled from 10 images (2 rows of 5) at 50mm, ISO 200, f/16, 1/20s.

It was incredibly cold standing there in the blowing wind over the ice but undoubtedly better than up higher.