Living in the bottom-of-the-freezer can give you beautiful skies, if you'll just look up once in a while.  The Bighorn Sheep may not notice the colors in the evening sky, and sometimes I don't either; then the Wind River Canyon can give you those moments that nearly stop your heart, as a beauty so rare comes to our eyes.  Colors that only exist in the mind of a child may suddenly appear in this magical place, and disappear so quickly you question if that sunset was real or imagined.  This wonderful Wyoming canyon provides a distinctly different perspective when those Crayolas are streaked across the sky, because here in the Wind River Canyon all sunrises and sunsets are heaven above.

     I had an art professor that once said, "There's no such thing as an ugly sunset."  Now that may or may not be true, and is arguable to some drunken extent; but have you ever seen an ugly one?  Here in the canyon atmospheric conditions can get a little weird at times; huge funneled winds, and a cold I hope you cannot believe.  Of course all sunsets are up, since there is no horizon.  We don't really get sunsets the way everyone else experiences them, so when something wonderful occurs, it's worth a moment in time to stop and take notice.

     Exactly ten days ago there was one of those magical moments that the Wind River Canyon is known for.  It was the end of the first week of the New Year, and the Sun had been swallowed up by the western rim of the canyon thirty minutes earlier, when the sky started to change.  It was so cold, high in the atmosphere, that the crystals in the clouds started to create some bizarre coloration.  There's always a pair of binoculars somewhere close by, and I stood and looked out the living room window at the rainbow-like sunset.  I said to no one out loud, "Wow, look at that!" and realized I had better get my butt outside, in the icy deep stuff, and get this particular Winter Sunset.  

     Not having the time to prepare for such a sudden photographic event, grabbing a camera I slipped on my mountain shoes and actually ran out into the snow.  The camera is always set for spot metering, as I photograph wild animals, so I lowered the ISO to 100 and aimed at this rare sky.  In three very short minutes this miracle of Mother Nature was gone forever.  It was the only time in sixteen winters that I have ever seen such a sky as this.  

     This Winter Sunset is really a strange one, and I tried not to exaggerate the colors or the effect.  It has to be seen the way it existed in this world, and not some fanciful planet that exists only in some software: I tried to keep this sunset true.  Heck, I don't even know what this sky effect can be called, but it is beautiful, and another of the millions of magical moments in the Wind River Canyon.            Winter Sunset, Wind River Canyon, WyomingWinter Sunset in the Wind River Canyon, Wyoming.

photography, writing by Michael John Balog

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