Of all the different atmospheric conditions that I love to photograph in, fog has to be my favorite. Nothing makes familiar locations and landmarks turn to mysterious unknowns faster than a layer of fog cloaking the landscape. Fog is fluid it ebbs and flows by the minute and opportunities for images and compositions open and shut with its waxing and waining.
In fact, when photographing and observing fog its movement and form mimics a living, breathing being. Like a breathing creature fog will inhale and shrink, than exhale and expand. One minute your standing above the layer of fog in the bright sunshine and the next minute your immersed in the cool gray mist as it covers the sun and sifts through the landscape.
The biggest problem as I see it with photographing fog here in Colorado and in particular in Rocky Mountain National Park is that it’s a fairly rare occurrence. While Moraine Park and the Kawuneeche Valley on the west side of Rocky will occasionally see low lying fog on account of the Colorado River or Big Thompson but normally your best chance to get large amounts of fog in Rocky Mountain National Park come during and inversion or upslope event with your best chances of getting dramatic lighting conditions coming as the low pressure system moves out of the Four Corners region or if you can climb high enough to get above the cloud layer.
Last week after what seemed like day after day of clear blue skies,(I know only us photographers complain about such a thing) we finally had the conditions I had been waiting for. A rainy and snowy few days in RMNP were about to end and the low pressure system behind it was set to move out Thursday morning.
Knowing that the weather was set to improve and that the timing of this coincided with sunrise I knew there would be a good chance for some drama at daybreak. I headed up to Rocky in the rain and fog but just below Estes Park I broke through the cloud cover and could not only see the full moon shining bright but the skies appeared cloudless. This was not what I was hoping for but I headed into Rocky to get a better look. Once above Beaver Meadows and Moraine Park I could see that there was still a nice layer of fog floating over Moraine Park.
I headed out in the darkness to a favorite spot of mine high above Moraine Park on Beaver Mountain. Here one is able to get commanding views of Longs Peak as well as Moraine Park and if the fog stayed in Moraine I hoped my elevation would keep me above it.
The fog stayed in Moraine Park this morning and my vantage point worked out very well. While Longs Peak stayed mostly in the clear, Moraine Park was shrouded with fog. Every corner of Moraine Park yielded a new composition and each one changed by the second as the fog moved in and out. After one battery change and a memory card nearly filled as well as the fog starting to clear out I figured it was time to hike out. All in all it was an amazing morning in Rocky Mountain National Park. Fog is rare and I’m sure if I lived in Northern California or the Pacific Northwest I’d tire of it but here in Rocky Mountain National Park I can never get enough of it.