In this Daily: Sunset Gin & Tonics and Why This Season’s Sunsets are So Impressive
This evening brings another edition of Santarena’s Sunset Gin & Tonics, an event hosted up on Santarena’s rooftop terrace that’s quickly become a town favorite. Up a few stories the ocean breeze is cool and refreshing, the rainy sunsets out by the Catalinas Islands are painted in colors.
We mentioned on the solstice that sunset is so colorful during this time of year thanks to the moisture in the air, and today we’ll take a look at exactly why this happens.
Why Green Season Creates Amazing Sunsets in Costa Rica
Above is the basic process by which a rainbow is formed in the rain. White sunlight refracts in a similar way through the millions of water droplets in a raincloud, creating the spectrum of colors that we see after a rainstorm.
It’s actually a similar process that creates the dramatic sunsets of the Guanacaste coast. If you’ve ever seen the sunset on a particularly dry night, it can be almost monochromatic, a warm shade of orange that lights the whole sky in a uniform way.
On a rainy season night, the opposite happens. Throughout the sky, uneven patches of moisture in the air mean that light is refracted more than once, creating layers upon layers of different colors. Each shade that you see in the sky exists because that beam of sunlight bounced a very specific number of times at a very specific angle, ultimately ending up right there where you stand.
Which is why atardecer, especially during the green season, there’s a uniquely beautiful celaje and sunset to see.