Sunrise 54: Ault Park (One-of-a-Kind Sunrise, Blooming Yuccas)

Beautiful Sunrise

Bloomin’ Yucca

In preparation for our trip, I had an early morning appointment yesterday that didn’t allow me to see the sunrise. We’re heading out tomorrow to San Fransisco and Sacremento, California, where I’m attending (and doing a brief talk) a medical device commercialization conference for work. I was hoping to put together the “best-of” for sunrises 11-20 but ran out of time! I’m thinking that our trip will be a good time to knock a couple of the best-of posts that I’ve been meaning to generate. I’m also hoping that while we’re out there, I will get the opportunity to do a couple “San Fransisco Sunrise” and “Sacramento Sunrise”.

Approaching the Park

Armleder Parkin the morning sun

Classic Overlook

This morning was meant to be a brief sunrise due to the fact that I still have to finish getting ready for the trip! I was about ten minutes late to the sunrise but when I arrived it was evident that the morning display was going to be one of a kind. The air was warm and a bit damp, but there was only a light mist down on the valley that provided great lighting dynamics without casting Armleder Park in a thick fog.

The bench and the bike

The sun had a respectable clearing just above the horizon that allowed the sunlight to bathe the valley in a deep orange color. There was a thin but highly textured cloud layer above the horizon that seemed to be changing by the minute as the sunlight crept over and through the many openings that revealed the blue atmosphere. I couldn’t stop taking pictures!

A bit of a lighter shot

If you’re on the front page, click to continue! About 20 pictures in all today.

Rays of light streaking through the sky.

The colors were great this morning.

After about twenty minutes the sun slipped behind the cloud layer. But the show wasn’t over yet. The obscuring of the sun made the larger cumulus clouds become light from behind – an effect that was more present in the early spring after thunder storms. This effect causes the clouds to cast a kind of “rolling hills” illusion. It always turns out well.

A vertical shot for all the dedicated PDF-reading monitors out there.

This was a great picture. Check out the plane taking off. I like this picture a lot because it hits all the lighter oranges as well as the dark blues.

On the way out of the park I took a final picture of the pavilion. The rays of light were coming through the clouds just above the structure.

Ault Park Pavilion – and here is the widescreen version

Neighborhood Yucca!

One of the white blooms on top of the plant

I’ve noticed over the past few days that a specific species of plant has started to bloom. After talking with a friend yesterday, he said that the plants were yuccas. I looked up the plant on Wikipedia, and from what I can tell the local variety is Yucca Flaccida. I’ve seen at least ten of the plants blooming just on Linwood and Observatory alone. The plant seems to be popular in Cincinnati but up about 70 miles north, where I grew up, I don’t recall ever seeing blooming yuccas, although that might more due to my lack of observational skills as a younger self!

One curious thing about the yuccas is that Wikipedia tells me that they are indeed not native to this area. The map shows flowering yuccas almost exclusively in the southwest. I wonder if all the local yuccas are related? Did a single nursery in the past few decades start selling yuccas in Cincinnati? How long have they been here? This reminds me that I haven’t made a post about the local “Cincinnati Banana Trees”. I’ll save that for later in the summer when they start blooming :).