Almost everyone has heard of the seven wonders of the
world. These are places considered awe
inspiring by, well, I'm not sure exactly who gets to pick the seven supposedly
most amazing places in the world, but I have seen a few and they are indeed
amazing. The Grand Canyon took my breath
away when I gazed over the rim. The
Parthenon left me filled with awe by it's magnitude and age. But I dare say I have seen wonders untold
that parallel, if not exceed those known to most of the world. There are not
words adequate to describe the beauty and grandeur of these sights, but I will
attempt with my limited vocabulary to share them with others. I have dozens of photographs as a witness to
my claims. I can't share them all here,
but I will include some as a testament to my words.
I spent the weekend gold panning in Wyoming. Did I come back rich? If you define rich using dollar signs, then
the answer is no. But, since I define
rich as the things that will follow me through this life and into the next,
then I came back with wealth beyond my wildest imagination.
To all those people who spend their days rushing back and
forth on crowded freeways from busy city to busy city, I invite you to
venture off the interstate and explore the wide open spaces of the West. How many times have you heard the words to
the song, America the Beautiful, "oh beautiful for spacious skies, for
amber waves of grain", without ever really knowing what those words looked
like in reality? Picture yourself standing in a field of thigh high prairie
grass, washing around you like an amber yellow ocean, grassy waves flowing one
behind the other. All around you there
is nothing but open air, above you wide, endless skies deep and vibrant blue. Travel a few miles across the rolling hills of
prairie grass and scrubby, pungent sagebrush and there are forests of soaring
pine trees with luscious green needles.
Mixed among the pines are clustered groves of shimmering Quaken Asps
with their fluttering leaves and knotted white bark trunks. As we bounce over the rocky roads my senses
are flooded by the sights and scenes
around me. The green of the trees as they touch the blue skies, gathering clouds move above the tree line turning
the sky purple and grey. A sleek, brown
doe appears and bounces gracefully across the road in front of us. We stop the truck and walk down a path to the
ghostly buildings of a once bustling town.
All around us the ground is covered with wild flowers, each
competing with the others proudly showing off their colors of violet, red,
yellow, copper, and white. The beaver's
have reclaimed this abandoned place as their own and moss covered ponds creep
up to the entrances to decaying log buildings.
We walk the paths where long forgotten people struggled against the
elements for daily survival. At the top
of the hill, sitting inside a pole fence, sits a lonely cemetery. Three lone markers sit behind an ornate iron
fence, now leaning from years of silently watching over the three young people who
lived and played here over a hundred years ago.
Rising against the skyline are magnificent cliffs of massive
stones. An eagle soars across the blue
sky. The sun glints between the
trees. Quietly and almost in reverence I
listen to the breeze dance through the branches.
The air smells of flowers, sagebrush and dust. I am in awe of those who carved out the
trails that we walk.
There is no doubt in my mind that if the deciders of what is
a wonder of the world were to travel here and walk these paths, they would most
certainly call this Wyoming wilderness one of the greatest, most magnificent
wonders of the world, and I am wealthy beyond my wildest dreams for having the
privilege of spending some of my time in this place.
