Even on the High Plains, it’s hard to find truly remote and essentially unpopulated areas of silence, solace and solitude, where the only noises other than the cool, moist breeze and one’s own breathing are the occasional calls of the meadowlarks and distant coyotes. This was one such moment, set among the wondrous aroma of moistened earth in a climatologically dry place. No other vehicles or people were encountered for the entire hour or so I was here. It was also only the northern sector of a stunning, tiered sunset with several levels of clouds and landscape involved: reddish low scud in the foreground, transitioning to pink-tinged middle-level altocumulus beyond, and still higher and mightier, the golden shield of anvil waves and mammatus splashed off the rear of a thunderstorm complex. The thoroughly glorious sunset lit up a vast swath of the sky and the landscape of Tertiary sandstone and ash bluffs—some of the same formations that give us the more heavily visited Scotts Bluff and Chimney Rock well to the southeast in Nebraska. All of the above made this one of the most deeply moving and spiritually renewing moments I have experienced on the Plains, and that’s saying something.
14 ESE Wheatland WY (5 Jul 19) Looking NNE
41.9734, -104.7166
Glorious Sunset on Multiple Levels
Even on the High Plains, it’s hard to find truly remote and essentially unpopulated areas of silence, solace and solitude, where the only noises other than the cool, moist breeze and one’s own breathing are the occasional calls of the meadowlarks and distant coyotes. This was one such moment, set among the wondrous aroma of moistened earth in a climatologically dry place. No other vehicles or people were encountered for the entire hour or so I was here. It was also only the northern sector of a stunning, tiered sunset with several levels of clouds and landscape involved: reddish low scud in the foreground, transitioning to pink-tinged middle-level altocumulus beyond, and still higher and mightier, the golden shield of anvil waves and mammatus splashed off the rear of a thunderstorm complex. The thoroughly glorious sunset lit up a vast swath of the sky and the landscape of Tertiary sandstone and ash bluffs—some of the same formations that give us the more heavily visited Scotts Bluff and Chimney Rock well to the southeast in Nebraska. All of the above made this one of the most deeply moving and spiritually renewing moments I have experienced on the Plains, and that’s saying something.
14 ESE Wheatland WY (5 Jul 19) Looking NNE
41.9734, -104.7166