Here’s the scene you’re greeted with at the Wolf Mountain Overlook at mile marker 424.8 on the Blue Ridge Parkway. While there are quite a few wide-open spaces along the Blue Ridge Parkway, this one is among my favorites. I had my camera set up on the tripod and waited out the light as an overcast and rainy sky broke up into this low scud. This overlook is covered somewhat by the balsam firs you see on the right, and a stone wall on the left (that first step is a doozy without it). Many people merely drive by without knowing what lies beyond that wall… get out and look people! I’ve found that the tripod often becomes a magnet, as people want to see what interests the photographer. Back when I shot film from my Mamiya RZ 67 “Professional S” camera, I had a busload of people surround me at Clingman’s Dome, when some woman from within the crowd said, “Stand back everyone! He’s a professional… he knows what he’s doing.” I nearly died laughing. While I do what I can to approach photography in a professional way, she was reading the camera, not me.

At this scene, an older couple did stop and walked up to see what I was seeing. This woman made a more sensible comment, “It looks just like a patchwork quilt!” She was right.

Wolf Mountain is actually in the distance near that bit of water seen near the middle of the image… that’s Wolf Lake. The area was so named because it was once the last stronghold for wolves in the Carolinas. This area was home to buffalo and elk, too, until they were totally hunted out around 1850. That left hogs and sheep to replace them on the wolf menu, prompting farmers to exterminate the wolves too.

In recent years, both wolf and elk have been reintroduced to these mountains. I’ve seen wolves early, early (0’ dark-thirty) in the morning crossing the road at a farm near Julian Price Park… I had to stop as they ran by in the headlights. The elk still eludes me.

This is a true panoramic of seven vertical images stitched together in Photoshop. The original file is 72"x27". Best viewed large, against black, with salsa and chips... hey, that's just how I roll.