Friday, September 11, 2009

Florida Keys Day 2, Part 7 | Nature's, man's fireworks cap off Day 2

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Finally in the Florida Keys and stuffed with a dinner of fried seafood Friday night, I checked into a resort motel next to the Atlantic Ocean in Islamorada. I was expecting a quiet night of relaxation. But when I went to the resort's oceanside pool, the horizon was lighting up with thunderstorms. Well out of the way of their precipitation, I started shooting the storms with a slightly zoomed-in lens.

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The tall, narrow structure of the storm cloud to the right, emitting the lightning, amazed me.

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A few bolts escaped and streaked horizontally across the sky. But already you can notice the tall cloud starting to break apart. The storm would be short-lived.

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The beautiful 360-degree views of the horizon on the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico from the Florida Keys afford many chances to shoot storms with clear sky in the photo, too.

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The edge of the anvil cloud neared the shore and began to obstruct the moonlight.

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After the lightning had died down, it was as though the photo gods knew I would get bored without any of nature's fireworks to photograph. So, man started to provide its own. From behind the Whale Harbor restaurant in Islamorada, I saw rockets shooting skyward. With a slight inward bend of the coastline between the resort and the restaurant, I was looking over the water at the fireworks. I zoomed in for a few shots.

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I wasn't expecting to get another chance to photograph fireworks until next Fourth of July.

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The restaurant came complete with its own fake lighthouse. U.S. 1, or the Overseas Highway, is off to the right, with car taillights visible.

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