Sunday Stills (07-22-12 Up In the Sky)

This week's Sunday Stills challenge is to photograph things we see up in the sky. Around New Mexico, spotting a hot air balloon is a common occurence.

The clouds were unusually heavy on the mountaintops on this day and the moon was still visible in the day-time sky.

This contrail is straight up and down. I wasn't sure if I could get the photo because the sun was right there, but I think it came out pretty cool.

Everyone sees stars in the sky, but stars made of clouds? I don't know if this was caused by one plane playing or what, but it was very cool.

Here are two experimental planes out for a morning soar.

And lastly, it's always a bad thing when one sees smoke in the sky. This was from a recent fire in the bosque (little woods) down by the Rio Grande river and within city limits. It spread quickly, jumping the river and threatening to engulf houses but, fortunately, was put out before causing massive damage (like Colorado Springs) other than a few hundred acres of trees. On my way home from work, I drove under the smoke and it was very eerie, causing everything I saw to take on a golden hue for a few seconds.

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