SHORELINE TRAIL, SOLSTICE
By Stephen Trimble
Photography: Stephen Trimble
Winter solstice, the end and the beginning. I walk the Shoreline Trail at sunset — to an easily reached knoll with a commanding view. This perch on the trail, where desert and mountains have equal weight, seems perfect to witness the year’s passing.
The sun drops westward, an orange ball over blue distance, closer and closer to the Great Salt Lake and its islands and the Great Basin mountain ranges beyond. At my feet, the valley sweeps away in snow-covered white. Alpenglow flushes the peaks of the Wasatch. The sun touches the horizon — out toward Nevada — then slips away.
I luxuriate in the moment, the place and the passage that mark our lives with beauty and grace and tie us to the rollicking cycles of Earth.
Stephen Trimble, a writer, editor and photographer, has published 25 award-winning books during 45 years of paying attention to the landscapes and peoples of the desert West. His most recent book is “The Capitol Reef Reader.” Trimble makes his home in Salt Lake City and in the redrock country of Torrey. www.stephentrimble.net; @stephentrimblephoto