Out of Hell and into Heaven

Driving across Hell's Canyon the other day, I saw a little bit of heaven:

 It was easy for me to appreciate these red maple leaves, but I can't lavish enough thick, gloppy words over the experience to cause a reader to appreciate the leaves.  Most of them see real trees-- you know, the kind with leaves of interesting shapes -- all over their hometown and yard.  'Hunger is the best sauce' as the old saying goes, and you must live in a gawdforsaken waterless wasteland to feel that hunger.

Another miracle: enough rain was prophesied that I actually relocated camp onto a hard surface.  It was exciting to visualize the possibilities with the clouds around camp:

There were many flowers and much green grass between the sagebrush:

One of the real bragging points of a camera is that it can take closeups of small, dispersed flowers and give them importance while blurring the background.

All this vegetation makes for some happy mule deer:

I hope the reader is as big a sucker for the silhouettes of animals on a ridgeline as I am.

I like these forlorn locations.  I say 'forlorn' not because there is no scenery at such places, but because they are overlooked and neglected by standard scenery tourists.