We'd stopped on a switchback in the narrow, winding road that drops down into the canyon. We'd watched the sun set forty minutes before, and now the sky was quickly becoming black, with only a fading glow to the west.

Fifteen wing barrels down, only two to go. I pulled over in a spot with a wide shoulder, part of the truck still hanging out on the pavement.

It doesn't matter. No one else will be here. And if they were, we'd see their headlights over a mile below or above.

I stopped to try to get this image

A task that took over a dozen shots to accomplish. And the best still doesn't do the view justice.

Again, I am ashamed to admit I don't know which planet that is hanging up there, but Jupiter would be a good guess. The reservoir gently reflecting the last light of the day is a lot closer than it looks. You can see the lights of Jim's house on the other side. I'm surprised. I'd thought they'd already moved. I got notice of their new email address.

We're over eighty miles from home, no matter which way we go. In fifteen minutes, the heelers' dinner will be late. Home, 30 airline miles on the other side of that mountain range on the horizon. A range you have to go around, not through.

Soon, we'll drop into the canyon, and sadly run over a bullsnake trying to warm itself on the road. Shortly after, I'll park in the middle of a bridge, in a silent, black, moonless canyon. And find I do not want to go to the bridge's edge, content instead to stand close to the safety of the truck. Gazing at the incredible span of our galaxy, sweeping past the dark grey corners of the steel lattice. The only light a dim glow in the recessed rock from the crack at the bottom of the immense steel door to the tunnel. There I will try a dozen times again to capture that view, the Milky Way behind a starlit bridge.

And fail.

But for now, I am still on the road above the canyon. Finally I have a shot that I feel is the best this digital camera will get. And climb back in with the subdued dogs.

And here I remember why the shoulder is wide at this point of the road. And shoot one last picture, before heading down to the bullsnake, and the bridge.