The Desert (The 2nd Water Tank)

For a week or so it was very hot.

Endlessly sunny.  Endlessly dry.  Endlessly hot.

Late one evening last week LC, Kory and I loaded into the Suburban and headed out to The 2nd Water Tank.

Which sounds like it may be something special.

It is and it isn't.

At one time years ago this land was used a good deal by farmers.

At this place there was power and water, and the remnants of that time still exist.

Nowadays farmers lease land for summer grazing of both cattle and sheep, but they spend only a few months and truck water in for their livestock.

We love this place because it is a wonderful focal point smack dab in the middle of the desert. 

It is surrounded by..........nothing.........in all directions.

Only a few BLM miles from town and with endless views of the buttes close by and the mountains in the distance.

This year (because of the snow we had through the winter and the rain we had through the spring), this place is completely filled with yellow wild flowers..................

After I opened one of the back doors of the Suburban, Kory eagerly leaped out of the vehicle and bolted to the left.

LC and I wandered to the right.

There is a huge fenced-off pen (that once was used to corral livestock but which now is abandoned and overgrown), and we planned to slowly wander the circumference of the pen while I snapped pictures and while our dog happily played and then disappeared in the tall grass.

I cannot describe just how different the desert looks this year.

There has never been so much life in this place - tall grasses and endless carpets of flowers covering the desert floor.

This piece of John Deere Equipment hasn't moved in the four years that we have lived here.

Neither LC nor I can understand the mentality of those who would abandon perfectly good farm equipment.

Sell it.  Give it to someone who can use it.  Donate it to a charity that could sell it to raise money.  But to just let it slowly decay over time makes no sense.

Regardless, right now it is partially consumed with yellow flowers and was one more focal point in a place with few focal points, and I snapped these pictures before moving on......................

I was wearing snake boots and LC was wearing snake chaps, and we waded through tall patches of flowers, enjoying this place very much..................

One more John Deere piece sitting forgotten and abandoned in the middle of nothing and nowhere.................

A puppy-head would occasionally pop up through the flowers, but for most of the time we were wandering Kory was lost in the growth.

Loving every minute of the adventure and "newness" of this place as it looks this year..................

By the time we were on the back side of the corral the light had changed.

It was late in the day, the sky was beginning to cloud over, the sun was beginning to set and the mountains in the distance began to stand out on the horizon.

It was a beautiful time of day..................

There is one antelope - a male - that has moved into the area.

He roams alone, is very skittish and so far has been impossible to get close enough to, to take a decent picture.

Big, healthy, fast, and he is beautiful.

I hope he stays around.

Zoomed in too far but this is the best picture I could take of him on this night...............

If you seek creative ideas go walking.
Angels whisper to a man when he goes for
a walk..........Raymond I. Myers