LIGHT and some rain

oh, this is he badlands by the way, not WY. strange world.









This was a great day. Hiking all the way up one canyon, over the divide and down the other side of the mountain. We were screaming at the top, we swam in freezing holly lake, and found wild huckleberries also.

Yikes.

Lovely cloud shadows. The clouds themselves felt very close, they probably were. we were at about 11,000 feet. and the sun!


Keyhole.


This is the smoke plume that rose for days and days from the fire in the Gros Ventre.

The last poppy left behind the laundry room.


The experience of driving past these mountains is really something. I like looking at them from far away too, and seeing the road on the flat, flat valley beneath, the cars look so so very small, and are often just a glint. Hiking up into them is a whole other story. When the day gets late, they begin to cast their shadow out over the valley, the shadow is cool and dark and slowly sreading, and the light at that time of day, shines through all things, not just on them, and just streams through the canyons. There is a high steep ridge behind the ranch that I would climb, it was always wonderfully windy up there, and one day I realized those beams of light were enormous. The tallest mountain itself is 13,700 some odd feet tall, and the valley below is so wide. One time, I was up on that ridge, seeing a storm move towards me, until I was suddenly in gray light and lots of fine hail, and a single, white puffy seed was floating up into the air, against the cold wet that was hammering down.