My family dropped me off at Hartsfield-Jackson International airport on the afternoon of the 25th. My parents were visibly upset and their fears manifested themselves in the fiercely possessive hugs I received from both. My sister was very excited for me and not quite as worried. They are a source of strength and guidance in my life and I will miss them the most this year.

My family waved goodbye to me as I walked into the security area. Fate elected me to be thoroughly searched from head to toe as my belongings were probed by the x-ray machine. As I was searched I watched people put on shoes and organize belongings while my laptop, wallet and other personal items sat unguarded in front of them. It was a little unnerving.

The first leg of my trip took me to Denver, Colorado and their beautiful airport. An hour layover later I jumped onto a two-engine DeHavilland Dash-8 turboprop and watched as the rugged landscape of Colorado and Wyoming slowly passed beneath the sky-blue wings of the small aircraft. Mountains and rivers bunched, pinched and shaped the landscape ino dramatic relief. The face of the planet itself appeared to me like the thick, weathered hide of some fierce beast.

After circling the small town of Cody, Wyoming, the airplane landed. I met my old friend Wes in the parking lot after claiming my luggage. He poked his head out the window of a beat-up white GMC van and said hi. i threw my belongs in the back as a light rain began to fall.

Our vehicle would be an ideal candidate for the Pimp My Ride television show. It was just that ugly. The exterior was a dented, faded white and rusted. Time and ultraviolet light had permanently burned the name of the van’s former employer - a plumbing company owned by Wes’ dad - into the windowless exterior. A long crack ran from one side of the windshield almost to the other like a fault line. Part of one headlight was missing. Within the van the power adapter for a GPS system blinked. When asked why a plumber would need a GPS system, Wes responded, nonplussed: “To make sure they aren’t fishing on the job.”

The van’s low-geared V8 grumbled to life and we were rolling. A stop at Wal-Mart to pick up a propane stove and we were off down highway 14/16 towards Yellowstone. I let my mind wander to the mountains rising in the west as we left town.

Now let me say right now that I have never been out west. My knowledge of the American landscape is restricted to the eastern seaboard and Missouri. The tallest mountain I had ever seen before today was Clingman’s Dome in North Carolina, rising a paltry 6,441 feet.

My mind was primed to be astounded, and mother nature did not disappoint. We passed over, around and even through mountains towering far past 6,441 feet. Wes pointed out how young this range was in geologic time. Most of the mountains were still pure rock jutting bare and naked towards the sun. A few had a smattering of trees and sage. It was like looking back at time. The Appalachians had once been like this millions of years ago.

Everywhere was the hand of man in evidence. A deep gorge abruptly became a shimmering lake. Houses dotted the tops of hills in the piedmont south of the highway. Blast cores like pinstripes covered a wall of rock rising hundreds of feet above the pavement where a crew had sheared the mountain in two to make room for the road. I marveled at the scale of these works as I reviled their incongruous position within the natural order.

“Welcome to Yellowstone,” Wes said as we climbed ever higher into the mountain range. Construction crews held up traffic from time to time, allowing the visitors to get out of their cars and take in the scenery. For hours we drove along massive Yellowstone Lake. It was so large that waves lapped against the shore and whitecaps dotted the horizon. Magnificent views of the surrounding mountains were numerous and we stopped often.

The van trundled over the length of Yellowstone and we crossed into the Grand Tetons National Park. Wes pulled the van over at Lizard Creek campsite. Wes had outfitted the van with a futon and shelves for food, but we decided to sleep in a tent because it was a clear night. Above our heads the Milky Way cut the glorious field of stars in two. I gazed up at them as Wes and I ate dinner. After dinner I passed out in the tent, so exhausted from my journey I could barely move.

The next morning we drank our instant coffee by the edge of Jackson Lake. The Tetons lined the horizon like sentries watching over the crystal-clear waters. Ducks, geese and magpies flew overhead. A motorcyclist named Kevin told us about an encounter with a wolf the night before. He and Wes talked motorcycles while I watched a Cessna fly low and fast over the lake.

After breakfast we drove south towards Jackson Hole. The road was easy and wooded and I had almost forgotten about the mountains when suddenly a view opened up and the Tetons dominated the western horizon, so close I could see where the snow clung stubbornly to the north-facing culs and valleys. It was awe-inspiring.

After a stop by the Jackson Lake damn to make some photos, we got a second breakfast and turned back towards Yellowstone. Wes was anxious to get back to Silver Gate where his girlfriend would be waiting for him. We turned towards Old Faithful and headed northwest through the geothermal basins.

We stopped at Old Faithful. Crowds of people swarmed the geyser, cameras and video camcorders at the ready. The geyser bided its time, patiently simmering in the cool dry air. Suddenly, it sputtered to life and blasted a jet of boiling water and steam high into the blue sky. Heads and cameras pointed up in unison, dumbstruck by the magnificent display of nature’s power. The geyser erupted long enough for a family of asian tourists to take turns standing in front of it for photos. I watched as they smiled and traded the camera back and forth. I listened to their language, straining to find out if it was Korean or Japanese.

Wes, who graduated from Auburn with a degree in architecture, walked down to the Old Faithful Inn to marvel at it’s beautiful hand-hewn timbers and turn-of-the-century construction. No two pieces of the lodge were the same. Columns made from the trunks of trees still bore the marking of insects and bark not to mention the rough axe strokes of some long-dead craftsman. The massive pendulum of a giant steel clock slowly counted off the seconds next to where we sat on the second floor.

We stopped at a couple more of the geothermal sites, including the Grand Prismatic Spring and the Terraces above the village of Mammoth. The scenery changed dramatically as we moved into the Lamar Valley running east to west along the North side of the park. Buffalo dotted the vast plains surrounding the Lamar River where fly fishermen plied their patient trade. Wes remarked that this was some of the best fishing in the area. On our left the mountains of the Asorka wilderness stood watch over the pristine valley.

Wes pulled the van over at an innocuous turnout identified as the trailhead for Trout Lake.

“Come on, you gotta see this,” Wes said as we started out for the lake.

The trail was steep and well-worn. Wes told me about how the trout in the lake run up the stream every year to spawn. The lake itself was amazing, resembling the kettle ponds I came across while walking the Appalachian trail in Maine. A few fishermen waved to us as we walked up the hill behind the lake, coming to a magnificent view of the valley we had just passed through. For minutes we simply stared in awe as tiny cars drove down the black ribbon of asphalt along the valley floor. The mountains glowed red in the afternoon sunlight.

It had been a good couple of days, I remarked, and Wes agreed. We ran back down to the van and rumbled off towards Silver Gate, just over the Montana border a few miles down the road.