"Yellowstone isolation," May 2006

Bryan and the bison

There is little that can heighten the feeling of isolation more than finding yourself staring out on the open vistas in the West, whether it's the rolling green hills of Yellowstone or the golden desert of Arizona -- or any expansive vista in between.

"The patient pine," Wyoming, May 2006

The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone

How could the patient pine have known
The morning breeze would come,
Or humble flowers anticipate
The insect's noonday hum,-

from "The Inward Morning," Henry David Thoreau

"Color becomes black and white," Wyoming, May 2006

Color becomes black and white

No special effects (as in, the click of a button in Picasa) here -- this is a full-color photo of trees in Yellowstone National Park on an overcast morning. The gray sky and muted backlight render the trees black. It's similar to one of my favorite photos, taken at Oregon's Crater Lake National Park, that for the moment still only lives on film -- yet another reminder that I've got to get organized and start plugging through some of those to get them online.

"Lost in the Mist," Yellowstone National Park, May 2006

I couldn't decide between the two. I like the vertical one for the scale and the bits of detail in the foreground and the stripped trees up on the hill. But I like the horizontal one for the simple solitude of a man alone with an umbrella in the mist. The combination of a cold rain on this gray May afternoon and the warm steam coming up from the Grand Prismatic Spring in Yellowstone National Park made this a thoroughly wet experience. It was like being in a sauna with the shower on -- while dressed. And I didn't have a raincoat, only a fleece.

"American bison, Yellowstone," May 2006

"American bison, Yellowstone," May 2006

It may have been May, but in the high elevations of northwestern Wyoming -- in Yellowstone National Park -- you can get winter weather late into the year. The day began cool and overcast, and it wouldn't have been a bad one to tour the park, but when we found ourselves getting out of the car in the rain to see a thermal spring, or when I had to tuck my camera under my coat to keep the snow off it when looking at the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone and the river's Lower Falls, it got to be a little much.

At this point, we were on our way out of the park, completing the loop we had started and about to hit the road south that would take us back to Jackson Hole. We noticed ahead a car coming in the opposite direction that had stopped; the vehicle in front of us braked and I noticed, through the falling snow, a bison crossing the road. As we approached the spot, we saw that the one that had crossed was following another; back on the right side of the pavement, where the first two had come from, three others remained.

Conveniently, the two bison had crossed at a turnout, so I turned into it and we waited. The second one to cross stopped barely 50 feet from the road -- where a half-dozen cars were now scattered, watching. As the huge animal turned and walked back to the edge of where the macadam met the grass, one woman got out of her car to get a photo, and Bryan and I laughed at the idiocy of this arrogant tourist. She returned to her car without incident, and we watched as the three lagging bison made their way, one by one, across to join the first two. This shot is of two of those final three, plus the one who crossed and waited, setting off into the valley.