Along the Southern California coast, days frequently end with a fiery burst of color filling the sky for a few moments before the horizon steals the sun until the morning. Truly spectacular.
But the spectacle of this finale should not overshadow the beautiful show that the sun performs as she slowly sets each day. Beginning in late afternoon when she bleaches the clouds beyond white and turns the sky to a glistening opal, then hanging low and growing to enormous proportions to fill the vista, then painting the the sky gold and orange as she begins to dip behind the hills of Malibu, to be followed by glowing pastels dramatically reflecting off the bottoms of clouds as she falls below the horizon and finally dies for the night in that fiery finale.
I was able to capture all of these phases of the setting sun over a few days during a recent visit to Marina del Rey, CA. Please enlarge them to full-screen to allow them to fill your vista.
