The sky was afire tonight as my wife and I pulled up to a certain hill with our cameras. I wanted to show the entire horizon, as the colors were spectacular, but this particular slice of the sky was most interesting. With this sunset Memorial Day has once again come and gone. That means you’re probably reading this on the job…get back to work!

This was the view from atop Hillside Park in Bismarck last night. I’d hoped to get a chance to stake out the sunset, but a 13-hour animating session kept me busy until just after 9 o’clock. After we checked the DVD master to make sure all was well, I dragged my tired butt into the truck and headed home, stopping by the park to grab as much as I could of the remaining color in the sky. This is the result of its waning moments.

Hillside Park in Bismarck is one of my favorite vantage points for photographing sunsets in our fair cities. A good sunrise, sunset, or aurora photo is lacking if it does not have a good foreground object, and the Bismarck-Mandan area is a foreground near & dear to my heart. If you feel the same way, join me on the hill sometime! Don’t be afraid to come on over and say hello.

The photo below is my favorite sunset photo taken from this area. I took it with a simple little $200 point-n-shoot digital camera in 2003. I believe it was mid-summer when the sun began to cross the horizon just behind the capitol building, it was a good catch.

Bonus: Click here to watch a video time lapse of this sunset (Windows Media format).

My wife and I sat on the tailgate of the truck last night waiting for a really spectacular sunset. It didn’t really look like one would appear so we off-roaded our way back to civilization and proceeded to head down River Road. Once we got near the Grant Marsh Bridge, though, we changed our minds.

This is the view from the riverboat’s dock platform last night. There were other people stopping in with their cameras as well. This is one particular spot that allows a person to get a really nice sunset picture without having it dominated by the refinery. Judging by the people coming in and out of Merriwether’s last night, we’re not the only ones privy to this secret!

I caught this particular sunset Friday evening from my favorite endangered sunset spot. There were others driving by with their cameras too, but none of them wanted to brave the mud and get to the bluff where I got this exposure. Doing so allows me to get out of the way of all the power lines and stuff that would clutter the foreground. It also allows me to kick it into 4×4 and do some climbing!

This is the trolley bridge in south Mandan, with the thawing Heart River beneath. And the Friday night sun. Yeah, I posted it Saturday…but this is last night’s sunset. I’m all about full disclosure on this site.

I know…how many pictures of the bridge and/or the sunset can a guy post? Well, here’s the deal. I was in the area when I saw this amazing sunset, and knew I didn’t have more than a couple of minutes before it set completely. So, I found the best foreground object I could. Too bad the sun itself had already ducked behind the horizon; it was a magnificent red tonight.

I haven’t officially declared Thursday as a weekly “Clint posts a sunset picture night” but it just worked out that way. I was on my way to one of my notorious “will work on your computer or motorcycle for dinner at Applebee’s” runs when I saw this gorgeous sky. So I flew up to the warming hut hill at O’Leary Golf Course and snapped a quick shot on the way.

I didn’t realize it had been three weeks to the day since I posted a sunset picture. I was lucky to get one tonight because the snow moved in just as the sun was approaching the horizon. Coincidentally there were also some nice clouds overhead as the pressure wave pushed its way through.

This is a rough time for a photographer as everything’s so drab and brown. The dramatic shadows of the lower sun are neat but not much of a consolation. Hopefully we get some heavy snow that will stick around for a while! It would be nice to post some sunsets reflecting off fields of white.

It’s been a little while since I posted a nice sunset. If you only knew how much mud I had to get on my truck to get this shot! Thank goodness to big tires, skidplates, and four wheel drive. This particular vantage point won’t be around long, with all the development going on in north Bismarck.

Stunning is the contrast between the bleak colorless ground and the vibrant cloud-streaked sky. Of course, if we were playing by the rules, those dead stalks and leaves would be covered under a pillowy blanket of white. But not today.

My friend Tony, who’s traveled all over the world and to pretty much every state, still claims North Dakota sunsets as his favorite. He’s in Alaska with his new wife now, so that’s quite a complement to our state. We might not have Alaska’s mountains (or bears) but we sure do know how to put on a good show when it comes to sunsets and thunderstorms!

The water’s pretty high at Fox Island. And frozen too.