Dawn Colour, Tasman Lake

‘Third time’s a charm’.  Nature is full of surprises.  The forecast for this particular morning called for fairly miserable conditions so I hadn’t set an alarm and decided I’d earned a sleep in after several long nights of astrophotography in the preceding days.  For some reason, I woke up early anyway so I peeked out the window to see a sky filled with stars and just a little cloud.  I nearly crawled back into bed but thought to myself, “why not, you’re up now” so pulled on the warm layers and set off into the freezing dawn for Tasman Lake. Arriving at the same spot that I’ve been to twice already on this trip, I noticed a small iceberg had floated closer to shore creating a lovely extra element that had been missing from earlier compositions. An hour before sunrise, the high cloud gradually thickened and faint traces of colour could be seen. The colour continued to build over the next hour until direct sunlight broke through onto the upper parts of Aoraki Mount Cook. I shared the sight with just one other photographer and I was very happy that my internal alarm clock gave me the nudge to wake up.  Some of my very favourite images come from unplanned moments and this was surely one of those.