This is another one of those images that happened almost as an after thought. I had risen early (that would be around 3am - yes, such a time does exist) and headed for Crown Point to capture images of mist and fog billowing around the rock formations at Rooster Rock state park.
It's about a 20 minute drive from home, and for once I had remembered to stop at the local convenience store and bought myself coffee.
It was still dark as I arrived at Crown Point, parked the car, grabbed my gear, and eagerly headed to the overlook preparing to capture wonderful images of the mist................. that wasn't there.
Surprisingly there were a couple of other enthusiastic photographers standing around, and we had quite the discussion telling each other that when the sun broke the mist would quickly form providing us with those awesome pictures we had given up so much sleep to get.
Looking West toward Portland we could see in the distance that that the moonlight was reflecting off the mist which was making a great job of covering the city. This convinced us all that our time would shortly come.
However, as the light started to brighten it became obvious that things were not going to happen for us on this particular day, so we reluctantly said our goodbyes and started to head to our respective homes.
Fortunately, the on ramp to the freeway is close by and having got onto the freeway I settled into a nice legal cruising speed, when suddenly a thought popped into my head.
Rocky Butte it said, and then more forcefully, ROCKY BUTTE.
By this time the dawn sky is starting to lighten, and sunrise is not that far away. Some quick mental math suggested that if I stepped on it a bit I might just, and I mean just, make it before the sun came up. At this point the morning is trashed so I'm thinking, what the heck, lets give it a go because you never know.
Daylight was upon me as I arrived at the parking area at the top (well - almost the top) of Rocky Butte. I grabbed my gear and ran, something I very rarely do, up to the lookout point at the top. Looking East back up the river I could see Mt. Hood in the distance as I hastily set the camera and started taking pictures.
The scene was absolutely awesome, the whole of East Portland was covered in a thick layer of low cloud, so much so that you would never know that there was a city below. As the sun finally came up, literally within minutes of me getting there, it rose over the right shoulder of Mt. Hood and cast this beautiful golden glow across the top of the clouds.
As is always the case with sunrise and sunset, the moment is fleeting and you have to be quick to catch it.
And this one time I think I actually made it and I got the image you see below.
I hope you like it.
