Brrrr..eautiful!

Powder-coated Sapphire Mountains, as viewed from the Lee Metcalf Wildlife Refuge.

We spend the afternoon of New Year's Day in the low-key but spectacular -- and mostly frozen -- Lee Metcalf National Wildlife Refuge, not far from our Montana home. It is a habitat for migratory birds that was established in 1963. As I write this, the temperature is 18 degrees, to go down tonight to 7 and up into the mid-20s tomorrow. That's where the high is most days. But it feels felt colder today, somehow! A light wind and lowering sun makes ice on the ponds, roads and streams look like winter taken to an extreme. The Sapphires to the east catch the sun, but the Bitterroot Mountains to the west have a stone, cold appearance. Cars full of birders and hiking nature lovers persevere. We all want to be out of the houses that we've been sheltering in for weeks on end.

A snow-topped frozen channel at Lee Metcalf (http://www.fws.gov/leemetcalf/index.html) makes permanent records of every animal's meandering path.

Up close, the tracks are even more intriguing.

The large pond of the first picture (at top) is one of the few areas of open water for ducks.

And dozens of ducks take advantage of it on this day, including two Golden Eyes on the right swimming near one of the ubiquitous Mallards.

A view from the bridge over a creek in the refuge shows a Mallard pair swimming upstream.

The opposite side of this bridge faces west and a setting sun.

As we head home, we spot a sturdy fence catching the very last long rays of sunlight.

Cold is how I feel every time I see an icy, empty country road such as this one on our trip home.

And cold but massively regal is the look of the Bitterroot Mountains on the opposite side of our valley.
We leave Lee Metcalf and head back to a living room that will feature a roaring fire, red wine and
a New Year's Day dinner of red beans and rice. New Orleans meets Montana, by way of St. Louis.
What a long, strangely wonderful trip it's been.