An exceptional photo of a routinely stunning north Mississippi sunset

For brilliant and dramatic colors, the sunsets in northwest Mississippi are among the best you will see anywhere. The terrain itself, low rolling hills, is not spectacular, but the colors are often stunning.

While I have had the good fortune of seeing dramatic sunsets in many places, the variety of yellows, reds, oranges, pinks and purples in the fiery sunsets of northeast Mississippi is hard to beat.

Sunsets viewed from Mount Lycabettus in Greece or from Key West in Florida are memorable because the sites themselves are unique. But the colors are no richer than what we see late afternoons traveling westerly from Tupelo to New Albany on I-22. Maybe it’s the pollution free skies.

Taking photographs of these Mississippi sunsets is a tricky undertaking, because the skies themselves are continually changing. Take a look at a sunset, then close your eyes for minute. Open them again and the scene is radically changed.

Although I have taken thousands of pictures in my lifetime, a few hundred of sunsets, I have never shot one that is better than the one at the top of this article.

Leslie Sumners took the one above late in July in downtown New Albany. She shared it with NEMiss.News. We thank her and are pleased to share it with our readers.

Photo by Leslie Sumners

Leslie clicked the shutter at exactly the right moment. Compare the picture at the top of the story with the one here in the body of the story. She shot them just a few seconds apart. That’s how fast it changes.