It was a hike, really, but a short one.  I had to make a trip down to El Paso and stopped in the Franklin Mountains on the way back for a short trip up a canyon.  It was a trail I had not walked before and I was disappointed at the rockiness of the old jeep road up.  The weather was poor: wind blowing up a lot of dust across the valley below.  In time my irritation subsided in the pleasures and challenge of the moment.

canyonThere was lots of red soil and rock

red rock

And yucca plants sturdy on the slopes.

yuccaI love the color of the hillside, but it is hard to capture: the deader stalks provide a background I think of as mauve, a sort of dusty dim purple, for the bright yellow-green of the scattered prickly pear.

carpet lookI can imagine a carpet in those colors, but since I have no place to put one, I admire it across the canyon. I return from an adventure like this thinking I must do this more often.  Spring and its increasing heat will be here soon.  I’ll hope for better light for photographs next time.

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