It came time to move on. Back to the hills of Park City and Cottonwood Canyon, back to the frozen slopes of sheer delight. Our bodies were rested, our energy was up, and frankly, the snow is melting so it's time to get in gear.
In retrospect, some of the impressions we reaped from Flaming Gorge were cast deep. There was the utter quiet on the reservoir...so much peace of sound that the common flight of the raven was transformed into a sensory experience, as one could hear the whssh whssh of wind over wing as the bird cruised overhead. There was the color and consistency of the earth, like ripe sunsets after a storm, infused into a clay mud that parted oozing underfoot. The utter stillness of the lake in the morning, mirror-flat reflecting a second world, upside down and kissing our own. The grey earth of Wyoming, as we cut through the corner of the state, and how it rose in sloping mounds, dotted with snow and shadows, looking more like an alien world than a midwest landscape. The way we seemed to own the world...the incredible, beautiful world.
We met a few folks to remember, too. Harry, at the Visitor's Center, is an ex-New Yorker who now volunteers for the Forest Service and moonlights as a nature photographer. He pulled out several sheets of slides and showed his wares, beaming with pride, and rightly so. Our fishmaster, John, eager to offer advice when asked and anxious to hear the results. He set us up with rafts and black jigs and the ways of the reservoir and the river. Beck, the Forest Ranger with a job to do, and don't you forget it. And then Sam Wells, the host at Dripping Spring campground, with his Santa Claus smile and his on-the-edge attitude. He putted around the campground on a riding lawnmower/tractor, radiating his love of people and declaring it aloud as well. He helped us out of a tight RV situation (which we're not at liberty to print in his defense), told us a few stories of his life on the road, and shared some very out-of-our league high-roller advice about shooting crap. We'll be looking for him next time we go through Vegas, if for no other reason than to watch him get crazy with the dice and the bank roll.
On our way out, we tried for some biking along a trail called Canyon Rim that sounded epic, but when we arrived at the takeout point we discovered that the trail was 87% covered in snow. We had to settle for a stroll out to the vista point, which was breathtaking. The Green River carved its way through the vertical walls of Flaming Gorge with a purpose, and left behind it a trail of awesome beauty: the Uintas mountains white in the distance, spits of green thrown across the flats, and this red earth parting into two towering cliffs on either side of the flowing water.
The road back to the resorts took us through a hair of Wyoming along Highway 414, where we stopped at a random shooting range along the side of the highway (it was deserted and we thought it was a rest stop type deal...the thousands of spent shells and tattered targets in the distance proved otherwise), found the offroad territory where they hold the Annual Hill Climbing Contest (that's on dirt bikes, not on foot), got totally muddy, and almost got stuck in the decievingly soft ground.
But we arrived back in ski country as the Sunday afternoon wound down. We took a shopping spree at Smith's for sustenance (aka grocery shopping), spent the night with the backgammon board, and let Monday play out as a day of maintenance (servicing the generator, truck, battery banks, etc). If all goes well, we'll be flying at Snowbird tomorrow.
