dawn of 2012

My first photograph of 2012 is taken before daylight as I scramble out over slippery rocks to the edge of the surf at Reef Bay on Mayne Island.

Unlike other favourite photography location in the world. I am the only one there. Not even a dog barking in the distance – just me and sea waiting to greet the day.

Sometimes a person must search for signs of dawn in order to be sure of the specific point of its arrival. It is not time yet but soon.

The lights of Vancouver are starting to fade in the distance from where it hunches below the cloud-covered coastal mountains. A softness surrounds the breath of this new day.

With each rolling wave the moments pass through my camera shutter. The sun has not quiet risen but with fingers stiff from the cold I press down to capture the first light on the sandstone shore.

Is this it? Could this be the moment we are waiting for – the dawn of 2012?

Possibly but let’s just wait a little longer.

Ah yes, there is a soft light starting to soak into the heavy clouds over the mountains.

A full dawn has come to Mayne Island.

Only twenty minutes have passed from the first rock we admired and we are now enjoying the richness of our first dawn in 2012 here on Mayne Island.

As we watch the brightness recedes into the soft reality of an overcast day January 1, 2012 here on Mayne Island off the southwest coast of British Columbia Canada.