I was planning to go out with my camera and troll for potential painting scenes yesterday, but I was stymied by the classic San Francisco early summer light. That is to say: fog, clouds, flat light.
Given my penchant for bright light and dark shade, each making the other more dramatic, this kind of day is deadly. You just don’t get sunsets like this in June:
San Francisco Chronicle columnist Carl Nolte writes about our June weather in today’s newspaper.
As a California native, I’ve lived with the fog of early summer every year of my life. As Carl explains, we usually have at least one good heat wave in mid-May and then the gray curtain descends. For much of the month of June, we have fog. Maybe the sun peeks out in mid-afternoon.
Except for the June days when the fog disappears and suddenly it is 100 degrees in the shade. I remember my 50th birthday – June 14, 2000. It was so hot that I came home, changed into casual attire and…ran through the sprinkler. Yep, 105 degrees that afternoon.
Ah well, soon it will be fall, when it’s warm and sunny here in the Gray Area.
Joanne Taeuffer 