Big Lake Sky #14280

The Story

It is hard to equal a sunset across water at any time, and this dramatic sunset across Lake Superior is looking west as the sun goes down. With the setting sun just above the horizon, across the water is one of the 22 Apostle Islands in northernmost Wisconsin. I was shooting in a small Bayfield County park at Little Sand Bay that had preserved an old fish camp as a historical centerpiece. That’s the old fish dock and shanty remnants in silhouette.

I was glad to add the character of the old buildings to the composition to give a little more interest and story beyond just the view of the evening sunset theater.

There was a small jetty protecting a marina full of small sailboats as part of the camping facilities to my right out of the frame. As I waited for the sunset, I watched one camper go to his sailboat carrying two bottles of beer who then puttered out by motor to a point just offshore, whereupon he threw out the anchor and settled in for the night.

It was that kind of place, a perfect quiet hideout nooked away from the rest of the world. If you’d like to find some relaxing peace in a beautiful setting away from it all, Little Sand Bay can easily provide it. I can only imagine how isolated it must have been through the fish camp winters in the early decades of the last century, and how hard and long things would freeze in the middle of a Lake Superior January.

As I was setting up for this shot, about two dozen campers were sitting along the jetty with their cell phones out and pointed at the sky which is probably a nightly occurrence there anytime the sky looks like it has colorful potential. I was the only one with a tripod and traditional camera, a photographic dinosaur serving as a sign of the times by contrast. I shot frame after frame into the dusk as the sky changed, all of us there at the edge of Lake Superior enjoying a quiet and very relaxing time as the Sky Daughter led us into the night.

Location: Little Sand Bay on Lake Superior near Russell, Wisconsin, Bayfield County. Picture and story © Andrew Dierks