May 21, 2012 ... layers of distance

An early start yesterday, saw me delivering my youngest son and his family to the airport.

It was one of those days which got off to a slow start before realising its full meteorological potential. There was scattered cloud, and a light but chilly Southerly breeze. There were, however, large areas of promising blue sky.

Looking Northward from Evans Bay on my way home, I could see that the Hutt Valley was still in the shadow of the Eastern hills, and there were was a trace of river mist draped around its shoulders.

On the valley floor, from this low angle in the city, through the gap between Matiu/Somes and Mokopuna Islands, the few tower blocks in the North end of the valley stand out well. They are the Heretaunga block of the Hutt Hospital  (centre) and the Avalon Studio (to the right). In the very far distance, in the soft light of a cool damp morning, the profile of the Southern wall of the Tararua Ranges can just be seen climbing towards the East.

In several directions, I saw examples of “receding planes” … row after row of ever more distant hills, each a little lighter as the distance washes out the reflected colour.  I put one such image on Facebook yesterday, showing Point Halswell  (the Northern end of the Miramar Peninsula   … click on the link if you are so inclined) as seen from Evans Bay.

However my pick of yesterday’s images is the view to the North from Little Karaka Bay, on Evans Bay Parade.

The now disused and soon to be re-purposed Avalon Studio building could be mistaken for a giant robot  stalking through the trees (click to enlarge). Though the day looks bleak, the grey tones are just the shadows of the hills, and as the sun rose in the sky, the colours of the day became blue and green and gold, and  the temperature went all the way up to  … 10 deg C!!!

The same sort of thing is happening today.

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