• There’s sagebrush here, and some small strangely pink-white flowers. Occasional grasses spring up.
• Small tan rocks around that don’t seem to belong, they almost look like quartz.
• There are flies up here, as well as ants and the occasional bee. Passed a small snake on the way up, as well as several large black beetles. I hear hooting, so there must be owls around too. The gnats can’t handle it up here it seems.
• Lichen covers the north face but not the south.

Sitting on a large basalt stone on the saddle. In front and behind the saddle the basalt wall rises,  Small vertical rifts cut into the north side, forming alcoves and caves. The south side is much steeper than the north. The dirt isn’t really dirt, it’s just pebbles of varying saddles with a light brown coat.

A harder hike than we expected, but a view well worth the trip. A treacherous path invites some eager-minded wanderers; pace yourself, slippery slope ahead! Steady footing, a place to rest, one look around and the shock of the view almost sends me reeling over the other side of the saddle. I have to take a seat; the weight of this massive place presses me to the ground. It smells of sun dried lichen with hints of sweet yarrow and musty sage. The dried out lake below is littered with basalt boulders, as if God, acting like a child, had spilled them and refused to clean up. Serenity fills me, and the chaos of the landscape fades to perfection.

The fear of heights subsides; I can rest easy at the top of the world. No wonder monasteries were built alongside cliffs, surrounded by air, pierced by screeching hawks. For the first time in a long time I slow down to Nature’s pace. The peace of this place grants me an unobstructed view of the surrounding landscape. I feel my old self eroding away, providing new insights into undiscovered terrain. Our own personal Mars focuses and becomes Earth as shaped by the universal principal of give and take. Broken and beautiful, just like us.