Spring Creek Basin Mustangs

Cassidy Rain is notoriously hard to photograph. As gorgeous as she is, she doesn’t like to pose; she’s too busy eating or ignoring the photographer. 🙂 But with snow lingering on Temple Butte and McKenna Peak (out of frame to the right), I had good incentive to try to catch her, you know, looking gorgeous. Unfortunately, the sun had winked behind a cloud just at this moment, so with her in the shade, the background blew out a little. But you get the idea. Gorgeous and gorgeous-er!

For us in Southwest Colorado, the “peak” of the annular eclipse was supposed to be at 10:30 a.m. The “path of annular solar eclipse” passed directly over the Four Corners, just south of Disappointment Valley.

I didn’t get any eclipse glasses, and I didn’t get a special filter for my camera lens. I just wanted to be *out there*, and with any luck, with a band of mustangs in Spring Creek Basin.

Although this wasn’t to be a solid eclipse, just (!) a “ring of fire,” and though I was out of the main path, my location was close enough that I thought there would be a noticeable change. … There was a slight dimming of the blazing, full-blue-sky sunshine – though my camera seemed to recognize it better than I did, and I had to crank the ISO higher to get enough shutter speed as bright as it was (seemed to be). My shadow seemed a bit “shimmery” at the edges. It’s usually very quiet out in the basin (unless it’s windy, which is usual), but it seemed maybe a bit *more* quiet. And the air, which started the morning in the 30s and was warming up by 10:30, seemed to get a bit chillier again, like going down through a draw or creek bed.

Subtle. 🙂

The eclipse *did* create these crescent-shaped shadows through some vegetation. This pic was taken at 10:22 a.m. The top pic of Sundance was taken at 10:30:25 a.m. When my shadow lost its shimmery edges, I figured the eclipse had passed. (Does anyone else think the image between the obvious crescents looks like a horse?!)

Rewind a day, and this sundog graced our southwest sky on Friday evening:

There was a sundog on both sides of the sun, but the one to the left was brighter.

Bonus celestial wonders the last couple of days!

Mysterium is squinty-eyed with the sleepies on a wonderful autumn evening under Temple Butte in Spring Creek Basin.

It was a night for layers! We’ve had a low temp in the 30s now in the basin and low country of Disappointment Valley. Gettin’ nippy.