Massanutten Mountain – Roadkill Crossing

Appreciating the Moment

The backside of a severe thunderstorm. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh

After last evening’s storm passed, I stepped out the back door to check my rain gauge when this amazing scene stopped me in my tracks.

We had yet another storm, but it clearly had intensified as it approached the Blue Ridge Mountains and Shenandoah National Park, which serve as the eastern boundary of Rockingham County, Virginia, where we live.

The view of the mammatus clouds from my driveway. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh

The setting sun dramatically illuminated the eastward-moving thunderstorm. The pouch-like clouds are mammatus clouds, formed when colder air aloft sinks into warmer air below.

Mammatus clouds almost always occur either at the lead of a severe thunderstorm or at the rear of the anvil-shaped thunderstorm crown. For meteorologists and those who appreciate and study clouds, spotting mammatus clouds is a rarity.

Since such clouds don’t last long, I wanted a view with a better line of sight. So, I headed to nearby Heritage Oaks Golf Course, behind an elementary school, which gave me an unobstructed view of the fast-moving storm.

As you can see, the turbulent clouds had already changed in the five minutes it took me to arrive at the golf course. Plus, the sun had set behind the Allegheny Mountains 30 miles to the west, changing the intensity and direction of its rays. Consequently, the colors of the clouds mellowed to more orange than white and yellow.

Please click on the photos to enlarge them.

Still, I was ecstatic to capture these shots, so much so that I never did check the rain gauge.

First Cutting

You know it’s spring when farmers make their first cutting of hay. However, making hay at the end of April is unusual, even for Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley.

After a recent overnight rain, the warm temperatures and days of clear weather allowed farmers across the valley to make their first cutting of hay. The windrows of mown alfalfa created the intriguing patterns in the foreground, with Massanutten Mountain looming in the distance.

Red Barn, White Mountain

Only a skiff of snow dusted the central Shenandoah Valley in Virginia, while the coastal cities and communities got hammered with blizzard-blown feet of snow.

The mountains surrounding the valley, however, received their fair share of snow. The snow highlighted the forest-covered slopes.

The Massanutten Range, which splits the valley from Front Royal at the north to Harrisonburg at the south terminus, especially stood out with its fresh snowpack.

By the next afternoon, the dusting of snow in the valley had melted. Massanutten Mountain, however, showed its snow. The difference between the valley and the forest-studded mountain was not only obvious but also stunning.

This photo was taken near Weyers Cave, Virginia, looking north to Massanutten.

The Old Oak Tree

Imagine yourself standing on a ridge on a beautiful, temperate fall day. Scattered soft clouds float eastward in a pale blue sky. A gentle east wind mellows the strong afternoon sunshine.

The grass is lush after some long-overdue rain. And a lone, giant red oak, its leaves just now turning to their rusty color, looms over the landscape like it has for a century or more. Battered by winds and lightning strikes, the rugged oak stands as a centennial for all who care to notice.

Miles away, the southern slope of Massanutten Mountain glides to the floor of Virginia’s magnificent Shenandoah Valley. Miles farther southeast, the southern section of Shenandoah National Park marks the horizon.

Fortunately for me, imagination became reality a few days ago. I enhaled the entirety of the precious landscape, not wanting to leave. Of course, I had to. Still, even as I view this photo, nature’s glory fills my soul.

Divergence

Massanutten Mt., Shenandoah NP, stratocumulus clouds, — Divergency.

When I left home shortly after 8 a.m., the sky was cloudy. The forecast was sunny. I wondered how “they” could get it so wrong. I was heading to Shenandoah National Park at the easternmost section of Rockingham Co., Virginia. By the time I got to the east side of Harrisonburg, skies to the northwest were crystal clear. I had hope that the day wouldn’t be gloomy after all.

By the time I arrived on Skyline Drive, the road that winds its way along the park’s spine, I could see that it was just a matter of time that the sky would clear. When I reached the critical point of the layer of stratocumulus clouds on the left and clear sky on the right, I had to take a picture. I felt fortunate to capture the meteorological phenomenon that scientists call divergence. That is, the air mass with the clouds was moving away in a horizontal direction from the air mass without clouds.

I used the Southern Pine as the marker of this weather DMZ. Massanutten Mountain is just to the right of the pine tree.

“Divergence” is my Photo of the Week.