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Look at the originality of this photograph that I share in La Vanguardia's Readers' Photos and that my friend John captured from my garden in Altea.
The shape that the sun draws reminded me of the title of a beautiful Led Zeppelin song called Stairway to Heaven and whose lyrics translated into Spanish begin saying: "There is a lady who is sure that everything that shines is gold. And she's buying a ladder to heaven. When she gets there she knows, if all the stores are closed. With a word she can get what she came for. Ooh, ooh, and she's buying a ladder to heaven. darling".
This staircase to heaven that we see in the image is called the solar pillar. A pillar light is an atmospheric optical phenomenon in which a vertical beam of light appears to extend above and/or below a light source.
The effect is created by the reflection of light from small ice crystals that are suspended in the atmosphere or that comprise high-altitude clouds (for example, cirrostratus or cirrus clouds).
If the light comes from the sun (generally when it is near or even below the horizon), the phenomenon is called a solar pillar, as in this case of the photo captured in Altea.
