Under Threatening Skies.

Saturday’s Errand Gone Wild  found me driving through the fertile plains of Hadley and Sunderland, long famous for producing some of the finest broad-leaf tobacco on the planet, coveted for use as wrappers on expensive cigars.  While a whole lot less of that crop is produced here now days, there’s still some production, though it seems to vary from year to year.  This year, this particular field didn’t get a tobacco crop, but it looked interesting to me under tumultuous skies:

I took that from the roof of my vehicle, hand-holding two crossed graduated filters as I held my breath, as though that detail might negate the effects of a buffeting wind.

The clouds at left were piling in like they intended to unleash a torrent on me and Elliot, and as I turned to appraise the situation, this shot was framed in my mind, and shot in situ:

Elliot pulled both of these shots off commendably, even though I was rushing like crazy to avoid the impending deluge.

But the deluge never materialized; instead, I got to drive up Mt. Sugarloaf and snag this photo of the spottily-illuminated valley below:

Taken from Deerfield, looking into Sunderland across the Connecticut river.  I had hoped for more color, but autumn wasn’t its usual vibrant self this year.

At least the end-of-day light was nice.