Scotty Smith's Orchids of Colorado. - Southwest Colorado Wildflowers

to be discovered. On the same trip, near Lake Louise, we were exploring thecountryside and just pulled off the road on a gravel pull out to let the traffic go by usand Paul spotted a northern twayblade, Listera borealis, on the damp edge of the gravel.Another fortuitous chance encounter that yielded unexpected pleasure.One of the goals I set for myself is to try to find my own example of the orchida group has been finding and photographing. One experience that I have goodmemories of occurred in Washington State near the Columbia River Gorge. Thegroup had been photographing the ghostly white phantom orchid, Cephalantheraaustiniae, in the open woodlands and had then stopped by a meadow with a brooktraversing it to look at Spiranthes porrifolia, the western ladies‟-tresses. After enjoyingthe orchids I set out to explore along the road to find my own site. Instead I found alush stand of Piperia elegans, the elegant lace orchid, which delighted not only me butthe rest of the group.This summer I was privileged to travel from the East Coast to YosemiteNational Park in California. Along the way to and from we encountered 10 species wehad not seen before and found new sites for many of them. This year‟s explorationswill fill my memories with lots of wonderful experiences from the soaring mountainsto the endless skies above the deserts and high plains. I‟ll remember discovering a newsite for a newly discovered orchid that added over 700 new plants to the orchid‟stotal. I‟ll remember discovering a perfectly beautiful Malaxis porphyrea, purple adder‟smouth,standing majestically on a hillside in New Mexico. I‟ll remember meeting178