The sun drops behind the ridge

 The sun drops behind the ridge… and the sky turns into a gold at the center, then bands of color fanning outward like a prism opening.

This is a mix of crepuscular rays (those dramatic “sunbeams”) and iridescent cloud color. The rays happen when the sun is low and broken clouds block parts of the light, creating alternating bright and dark lanes. From your viewpoint, the beams look like they spread, but they’re actually nearly parallel—it’s just perspective, like train tracks meeting in the distance.

The rainbow tint comes from tiny droplets or ice crystals inside thin cloud layers. When the particles are small and evenly sized, they bend and scatter sunlight in a way that creates soft, pastel-to-saturated color bands—especially when the sun is close to the horizon and the atmosphere is already warming the scene.

One extra detail that makes this look so powerful:
The lake reflection doubles the geometry, so your eyes read it as a full “light dome” — sky above, mirror below — which makes the moment feel amazing .

Where you can see this: anywhere with big open views—mountain lakes, wide valleys, coastal overlooks—right around sunset or sunrise, especially when there’s a broken cloud deck and a bit of haze in the air. Think Rocky Mountain foothills, Pacific Northwest lakes, the Alps, the Carpathians, or any high viewpoint looking west at day’s end.