Skywatching at Home

I have always been writing in my posts that the December Holiday season starts the coldest time of the year in this part of the world. Then it starts getting hot again in mid-February or March, the start of our dry season. So officially the colder months also fell on the rainy season. We only have the wet and dry seasons in this part of the tropics. And our cold will be even hotter than the summer of our counterparts in some temperate countries. This means...hold your breath.... 23-25°C is already colder for us here in the tropical Philippines lowland. 

But my home in the province at ~500 masl is a little higher than our lowlands. We sometimes have foggy mornings and even colder dawns, time when we wear our sweaters and socks. During the Christmas Holidays it was already cold with our standards. But i still want to have some sunrise shots. I always see them on our east window, so when it looks so bright at dawn i immediately go out of the house despite the chill to get some vantage point. I walk along our road a few minutes and take shots whenever there is some clearing from the so crowded trees and plants. 

Here are some shots, SOOC, for roughly 10 min before the sun emerged at the horizon! They now ended up on my office desktop background. 

Skywatch Friday

A lovely morning!

How would you like to wake up with this scene peeping through your window? 


If you are living in the big city like me, sunrises are very difficult to see. I am just luckier that i have all the sunsets because i live in the fifth floor with windows facing the west. I am double lucky as a tall building is not rising yet next to us, and we can never say when that moment will come. I am a little bit assured of more sunsets in the years to come because private properties with detached single houses are at my side. 


So sunsets and mornings are very special for me, i see them only in the province. I intentionally open my windows to let the morning colors bathe me while on the bed. And it never fails  to wake me up before dawn colors dissipate. The open windows also allows the newly generated oxygen sustain me very well through the night, while i am happily dreaming of wonderful futures, which include fully forested mountains and cities devoid of pollution! How wonderful to sleep in clean environments, where breathing is not a hassle at all. 

This is a mango tree with dense canopy

A young forest tree

Our house in the province is on the highland, and although we are far from the sea, we can still see it in the horizon. We are surrounded by already tall trees, most of which are fruiting during their specific season. Not only the morning colors wake me up. Tweeting birds are so happy in the morning before sunrise. And I already learn to distinguish the birds through their tweets, my niece and nephew taught me about them. 

A mature custard apple tree whose branches I sometimes trim for reaching the window. Beyond is a coconut tree laden with fruits, we have lots of them in our property.

Sun rising on top of a citrus tree behind the coconut

Do you agree now that we have a beautiful place in the province? But i agree with you, it can be relative! It might be beautiful only for me because i compare my situation in the big city. If you are living in a resort house near the beach or a garden resort, that is another story!   But I will still fight for my decision, cause what is the old saying for, that "beauty is in the eyes of ....", you know the rest!