Borrego Springs is mostly deserted in August. The temperature
is normally about 110 during the day, but if the nights are clear, it is a good
time to photograph the stars. So I set my alarm for 11 o'clock and drive ten miles to a site that I had scouted earlier today, where the conditions should be good. When I get here, it is dark to the North, where I plan to shoot, but I turn around and realize that the view back towards Borrego Springs might just be the best.
Wow, it looks like the mothership is getting ready to land.
When I do set up my gear looking to the North, I set a time exposure to track the stars as they circle the North Star. That means I am sitting with nothing to do but look at my watch for a half an hour, and I realize how absolutely silent it is. Not even any wind tonight - only an occasional yip from a nearby solitary coyote.
Now it is Thursday morning and the clouds are building over the
mountains to the west. I spend time taking time lapse images of the cloud
patterns but you never know what you are going to get. You just hope that you
are pointing in a direction that is going to be interesting in an hour or so
and this time I am fortunate – the clouds are churning and the shadow patterns
race across the mountains and the desert floor. Towards lunch, it definitely
looks like rain is on the way, and by the time I get to town, thunder and lightning are
booming, preceding the rain. I stop at Borrego Outfitters and the shopkeepers
are outside, looking at the sky and deciding whether to go home to prepare for
the storm. They decide to stay, and I buy a few camping gadgets that I may or
may not need some day, but a lightning strike nearby kills the power and they need to add up the sale in
the dark by hand. With the power out I think that Kendall’s
coffee shop might only have ice tea, but when I get there they are serving cold sandwiches too, and tuna
salad sounds good. I see the cook in the back is having issues with the
darkness, and I dash through the rain to my car and retrieve my camping
headlamp, which is greatly appreciated. His friends joke with him, in Spanish,
saying he looks like a miner.
After lunch I decide to try some more cloud photographs and
head to a site with good views but what I see is a great column of smoke rising
from across the valley – likely from a lightning strike into dead tamarisk
trees that had been crop windbreaks before the desert conditions overtook them.
I have plans to try a second night of star photography, but I see a great wall
of dust moving in from the Salton Sea and I hurry back my room before the wind
arrives, turning the sky pale brown. No chance of decent conditions for
photography, so I have the night off.
In the morning, I am rested and find a spot to see the sun
rise and it is glorious, with the dust in the air adding a softness that
offsets the glare of the desert sun.
