The best sunsets around the world

We’re sorry, this feature is currently unavailable. We’re working to restore it. Please try again later.

Advertisement

This was published 9 years ago

The best sunsets around the world

After a lifetime feeling nonplussed about sunsets, Ben Groundwater has finally had an epiphany.

By Ben Groundwater
New horizons: After developing an appreciation for sunsets, Ben Groundwater admits he went a bit sunset crazy.

New horizons: After developing an appreciation for sunsets, Ben Groundwater admits he went a bit sunset crazy.Credit: iStock

I've recently become obsessed with sunsets.

It's a recent thing because up until now my official position on sunsets has been: "Meh." This is not due to being curmudgeonly or anti-cliche, but because sunsets for me aren't the same as sunsets for everyone else.

I'm partially colourblind. Not colourblind enough to ignore traffic lights or dress like Geoffrey Edelsten, but colourblind enough to prevent me from becoming, for example, a fighter pilot, and colourblind enough to render things like sunsets chronically underwhelming. They're just not that great.

It's hard to describe to someone exactly what you see, but as far as I can tell the world through my eyes is a little like the way photos appear before you put them on Instagram. They start off looking OK, but throw a few filters on there, pump up the contrast, and wow, you've going in National Geographic.

My world is pre-Instagram. Yours is post.

Rainbows, frankly, suck for me. I can see a band of blue in the sky, and a band of yellow, and that's it. In a particularly vivid rainbow I can sometimes see a band of red. Big deal.

So sunsets have never been particularly impressive. They don't have the "pop" that I expect. My mum is an avid appreciator of a good sunset, and all throughout my childhood she'd be pointing and gasping at golden horizons while I just shrugged and wondered what else I could be doing.

Now, however, I'm finally getting it. This isn't because I've had my colour vision fixed up, but because I've been to a few places recently that have absolutely stunning sunsets, sunsets that even I can get excited about. And the more of these I see, the more I want to experience.

This phenomenon reached its peak in Western Australia. Have you seen sunsets in Western Australia? They're insanely good. Surely the best in the world.

Advertisement

There's something about the sun setting over the ocean that's special, but WA has more going for it than that. It's hard to put your finger on.

There are these long twilights that ease you gently into the night. There are stunning colours painted across the sky, splashes that change from orange to red to purple to pink. (At least, they do to me anyway.)

Every night in coastal Western Australia, from Denmark in the south to Broome in the north, nature is putting on a show. It's different every evening, a new performance equally as spectacular as the one before. I don't know how anyone gets anything done as the sun dips towards the horizon over there.

I went a bit sunset crazy in WA, like a vegetarian who's just tried meat for the first time and suddenly wants steak for every meal. I wanted to package those sunsets up and take them home with me. I raved weirdly at locals about how good their daily light shows could be.

And it made me realise that I've experienced other great sunsets around the world, that I've been to places that can equally boast reliably spectacular scenery at the end of the day.

Places like Morocco, a country that can't do anything by halves. Spend a night out in the Sahara and watch the sun as it burns the horizon a crisp red while it dips below the sand dunes. Head to the coastal town of Essaouira and watch the ancient city walls turn orange and pink as the sun heads towards the ocean. Tell me you're not impressed.

Photographers line Essaouira's stone ramparts every afternoon, shooting film the way soldiers must have fired those old cannons that still share their space.

I've marvelled before at the dying of the day in western Scotland, around the Isle of Skye. There's a beautiful softness to the light at any time in that part of the world, but at sunset the water, the mountains and the little towns are washed in pastels for what seems like hours.

I've searched for perfect sunsets in the Serengeti. I've hunted for the cliched but elusive scene of a giraffe in dark silhouette, reaching up to nibble on a flat-topped acacia tree as the sun glows bright behind it.

I've watched from Malolo Island in Fiji as the sky was painted with such bright colours that if I'd painted a picture, no one would have believed me. I've stood on a hill above the town of Taormina in Sicily and marvelled as the old stone buildings glowed, the Mediterranean sparkled, and Mount Etna bubbled and rumbled high above.

I've stood there in country after country, camera in hand, mouth open, raving weirdly to anyone who'd listen about these beautiful things called sunsets.

Cut me some slack. It's a new obsession.

b.groundwater@fairfaxmedia.com.au

Sign up for the Traveller newsletter

The latest travel news, tips and inspiration delivered to your inbox. Sign up now.

Most viewed on Traveller

Loading