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When you’re surrounded by people and traffic and noise all the time, which is the norm for too many people these days, you get to think you can never be alone. It’s not like you want to desert humanity (well, maybe some days in the office bring on that desire), but a brief foray to someplace wild and free and . . . silent sounds appealing.

“I want to go to the mountains, but I don’t necessarily want to climb them,” people object, but the good news is, you can find beautiful places even very close to crowded ones.

This view of Mt Nebo Range, which I painted after a visit through Utah in the U.S. Southwest, caught my eye from, of all places, the freeway, less than an hour south of Salt Lake City. At the first opportunity I got off and in a short time found myself in just such a wild, free, and silent place. With enough distance, the freeway noises disappeared, and so did all the noise and people and traffic.

These hidden places are everywhere, but that’s just it– they’re hidden. Not impossibly so, but enough so that only the people who stop, get off the freeway, and are willing to take a little time traveling bumpy roads and wondering if they’re lost, find them.

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Mt Nebo Range