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[1]
October 2010
It begins in early September. First a few spots of yellow and faded green. A little orange scattered amongst the Aspen goves. The temperatures are very cool in the morning. Even cold. Frost covers the ground most mornings. Days are warm and pleasant. The early morning sun filters amongst the groves even now illuminating trees in a little different brilliance. It is just a hint of what is coming within a matter of days. Elk are bugling. Their call echoing throughout the mountains and valley floors. There is a change in pace of all the birds and critters scurying about with a litle more purpose. The dog days of summer are gone replaced with this definite quick change of the season.

[2]

October 2010

Within days the early morning now casts lights filled with penetrating translucent colors. As shimmering and reflective as the Aspens themselves. This is the time of the Aspen clothed in the full glory of gold.

[3]

October 2010

frosted ground. Yellow and gold. Some orange and occassionally red in the trees. Mornings in as Aspen grove are a brilliance of color that dazzles the eye. even the white bark carries an ochre to greenish gold coloring. This year has been perfect for color as cool nights and dry days are the ingredient for the brightest of colors. Night time temperatures have been below freezing but not to the point of that killing kind of cold that turns everything to yucky brown and greenish black. It is a perfect year.

[4]

October 2010

It is pure pleasure to be able to walk amongst Aspen groves taking in their royal garments of gold. Listening to the lightest of breezes setting the leaves to music all due to the way their petiols[stems]are attached leaving the leaf perched almost precariously at the end. So well designed by our Creator for not only for function but for the enlightenment of all who will stop and take the time to see.

Birds and wildlife both large and small all inhabit this important ecosystem and also add to the pleasure of the visitor. Birds constantly add to the chorus of the leaves.

[5]

October 2010

Most days are warm and with very cool nights the time of the

aspen is not long lived. Leaves finally give way to wind and gravity falling as gold rain and covering the ground beneath with a beautiful gold carpet interspersed with grrens of browns of grass and reds of Wild Rose and Fireweed. It is all a grand kalidioscope show of nature.

After a rain or when a snow falls and melts the warmth of the day can heighten the senses with a wonderful odor that permeates an Aspen grove that is sweetly pungent and refreshing to the senses. A grand time to hike from grove to grove-taking it all in.

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I especially love the early mornings and evenings to be out and following the light of the day illuminating the myriads of forms of the
aspen. Their contrasting colors and habitats with Pine-Spruce and Grass-Sagebrush all create a diversity of form, color and texture all contributing to such an elegant and calming viewscape.

[7]
October 2010
Their contrasting colors and shapes are also perfect backdrops to the mountains in this area.

[8]

October 2010

Vistas are perfectly framed with the enhanced coloring and brightness of Aspens such as in this scene looking towards Gannett Peak. The highest point in Wyoming at 13,804' south of Dubois.

[9]

October 2010

All too soon the Aspen season is over. In just a few weeks trees and groves have gone from touches of yellow and orange to bare trees deprived of their glorious cloaks. The gold of leaves on the ground have withered and dried and are brown colored as they begin to decay. Not lost but only a part of that returning to the soil the neccessary nutrients that once again bring forth a new season of growth climaxed by crowned gold.

The only gold now found is in the setting of the sun. The gold in clouds perhaps simply borrowed from a season of the Aspen.