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Hide `n' seek

Catching a perfect sunset takes a lot of luck. You have to be at the right place at the right time

ALL ABOUT TIMING Catching a perfect sunset takes a lot of luck

There is something magical about sunrise and sunset. Though a daily phenomenon, what makes it special is the fact that no two sunsets or sunrises are ever similar on any day or at any place. It is not anything supernatural but has to do with the composition of the air and the clouds in the atmosphere.

Among sunrise and sunset, the one that is very difficult to observe is the perfect sunset. More often than not, the low-lying clouds will obscure the final part of the sunset when the sun disappears into the horizon as a bright vermilion disk.

So once while travelling through a small town called Saragur near Mysore, I was told that the sunset from a plateau above the town is spectacular. Forests and the towering Western Ghats ring the town situated near the backwaters of the Kabini Reservoir. But as luck would have it in the middle of summer, grey clouds showed up from nowhere and by afternoon it was raining hard. By four p.m., I had lost all hope of watching the sunset. Then all of a sudden, a strip of sky parallel to the ground on the western horizon opened up. The sun was still behind the clouds but it was enough to light the strip a golden yellow. I quickly hopped on my bike to head to higher ground to get an uncluttered view.

I reached the plateau but still there was lots of time left for sunset. But as the sun sank lower, it started silhouetting the rain that was falling at a distance on the Western Ghats. The mountains were painted golden by the sun even as the black and grey waves of rain drenched them.

While I was busy clicking photographs of the distant rain, I noticed two local villagers. Finally one of them couldn't take it anymore and asked: "Enu photo tegitha idhira? (What are you clicking?)"

I replied that I was shooting the rain and waiting for the sunset. They watched me for some more time and finally ventured: "You will get a much better view if you go further up the road."

And one of them offered to come with me on my bike and show me the place. But halfway there, the cunning fellow told me to stop, got off before what was clearly his house, and asked me to go for a couple of kilometres more with a warning: "Don't stay there after dark. Rogue elephants cross there. Just last week, someone was trampled."

I reached the spot on top of a small hill and just as I parked my bike, the sun dropped down from the grey clouds. The scene was surreal. The sky was grey from the eastern horizon and suddenly stopped just short of meeting the western horizon, leaving a small strip for the sun to finish its show.

I started furiously clicking photographs with a lone tree providing an ideal prop to shoot the golden orb with. As the sun sank lower, in a deeper shade of red, it appeared as if a glowing fruit was falling off, slowly, from one of the branches of the tree.

Lost in watching the sunset, I didn't notice that it was getting pretty dark where I was standing, and just at that moment when the sun was at its lowest, my luck ran out and the heavens opened up. It initially began as a steady drizzle but soon it was a torrent. I had to pack up and move fast. As I rode slowly back to the town, I saw the sun sink by fractions into the horizon. And just as it was about to disappear fully, a last act of defiance, a brilliant rainbow.

ANAND SANKAR

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