Bobby Beasley was staying in his 1984 Volkswagen T25 Campervan with girlfriend Rach when he took this photo. The couple were on the Isle of Harris, in the Outer Hebrides. “We’ve both always loved camping and getting out to remote spots, preferably on the coast,” Beasley says. “The west coast of Scotland is one of our favourite areas to explore.”
On their first morning at Horgabost Campsite, with its views over Luskentyre beach and its Caribbean-style white sand and turquoise waters, they awoke to a thick sea fret. “As it burned away and lifted a little, the early morning sun shone through from the mountains behind and caused this crazy-looking ghost rainbow,” Beasley says. The pair didn’t lose their chance at this shot, “hence why Rach is standing in her pyjamas! I didn’t want to miss the moment, especially as it was positioned so perfectly over our van.”
With that in mind, Beasley used the camera most immediately at hand: his iPhone 11. He applied no edits aside from cropping to a 4:3 ratio. “I made sure when taking it that I’d put the focus on Rach and that the sky wasn’t overexposed,” he adds. “I liked having my shadow in the shot, too. It makes for a nice triangular composition.”
The pair had never seen anything like it before. While the mist stuck around for the rest of the day, casting an ethereal light on their surroundings, the ghost rainbow was soon gone.
