This morning when I got up, an unusual sight greeted me.  There were clouds below the mountains, filling the valley all around us.  Most of the days in Death Valley are beautiful and cloudless, but we have had several days of snow and rain:  snow above 5,000 feet and rain below that elevation.  Consequently it has been cloudy and the mountains around us are covered with snow.

The different view was stunning.  As much as I enjoy the clear, warm days, the clouds sitting right on the valley floor made heaven seem very close.  I grabbed my camera and headed out the door, hoping to capture a little of the beauty to share with you.  Birds were singing, but there was no wind and no cars ventured into the fog.  The rising sun played through holes in the clouds and shone first on one glistening mountain top then on another.

The other rangers call days like today “ugly” days.  People don’t like to come up to the castle when it is cold and raining.  But the sun playing with the clouds revealed a spectacular beauty that took my breath away.  Angels danced in the sunbeams and on the mountain tops.  God spoke in the whisper of the moving clouds.  And I worshiped, rejoicing in the blessing of a morning obscured and revealed by the clouds.

Praise the Lord, O my soul.  O Lord, my God, you are very great; You are clothed with splendor and majesty.  He wraps himself in light as with a garment; He stretches out the heavens like a tent and lays the beams of his upper chambers on their waters.  He makes the clouds his chariot and rides on the wings of the wind.

May the glory of the Lord endure forever; may the Lord rejoice in his works – he who looks at the earth and it trembles, who touches the mountains and they smoke.  I will sing to the Lord all my life; I will sing praise to my God as long as I live.  May my meditation be pleasing to him, as I rejoice in the Lord.

Psalm 104:1-3, 31-34