Mountain frames highlight abundant stars

What is a Wyoming summer without adventure? Last week, three friends and I trekked into the backcountry to experience some of the best the Equality State has to offer.

Loon Lake, just outside Yellowstone National Park, gives an exceptional remove from summer crowds and light pollution, allowing for some fun night photography. The namesake loons’ melancholy call — extremely rare in Wyoming — provided a beautiful punctuation to the thick silence.

After two days coaxing Yellowstone cutthroat trout from their hiding holes, we struck off to new waters — and much older mountains — in the Absaroka Range.

The Wiggins Fork of the Wind River drops almost due south from the Absarokas to Dubois; the wide drainage framed the night sky, drawing my eye to the North Star. 

Despite the glow from Cody, roughly 50 miles north-northeast, the dark sky gives a rare view of our Milky Way.

Wyoming, where dark skies abound, is a great place to look up.