Behind the Photo: Best of 2016 - Tyrolean Sunrise

I think I mentioned this in an earlier post, but we spent most of the trip camping.  Camping in Europe is wonderful - campgrounds have a plethora of amenities and most of them have very clean bathroom facilities (that's the thing that matters the most to me; I'm a bit of a germaphobe).  

Hallstatt was our first night of camping on the trip and needless to say, it was just short of a disaster.  The weather was awful, it was cold and rainy.  The campground was busy, which was fine, but immediately next to us was a family was difficult to be next to.  I was woken up at least three times that night by screaming children.  Now I don't have children, so I won't pretend to know what it's like, but maybe camping isn't the place to take screaming children - other people would like to get some sleep.

The reason I am mentioning the screaming kids is because it's why this photo even happened.  Around 4:30am I was yet again woken by the screams of a child.  I was annoyed, I won't lie, but I decided that given the time, I would look outside of the tent and see what the sky looked like.  It was overcast, but it looked like it had potential and I couldn't fall back asleep, so I decided to get up and walk down by the lake.

No one else was up and when I arrived by the waterfront, it was just me and a family of swans.  It was peaceful, something I hadn't experienced at all the night before.  Looking across this lake carved out of the mountains, calm and still water - it was wonderful.  The light started to break and the valley slowly lit up to my left.  I wanted to focus my camera on the old town of Hallstatt that is commonly photographed, but the colors were most vibrant across the lake - which is the view you see here.

I'm typically one for sunsets because they tend to coincide with my schedule better, but every now and again I get up for a sunrise.  This was one of those that was every bit of worth it.

 
 
Tyrolean Sunrise

Tyrolean Sunrise

TJ SimonComment