Chugach Moon; Anchorage, March 9, 2017
Prolonged cold, clear weather has provided frequent views of the moon as it crosses the sky over the Chugach Mountains above Anchorage. Here it is faint in the bright daylight of late afternoon, while the sun still dominates. The moon will have to wait several hours before it takes sole possession of the sky and becomes so brilliantly white it leaves shadows on snowy landscapes. Dry snowfalls that more easily slide, blow, and sublimate and few wet snowfalls have left many Chugach ridges bare.
The moon is always fascinating, but waiting an hour for the sky to darken would have allowed the moon to rise too far above the mountains for a long lens to capture both with enough detail to be interesting.
In comparison, I spent two hours the evening of March 11 waiting for the moon to rise over Alyeska, but it declined by coming up behind Max's Mountain, instead, out of the frame entirely. Here is the ski area, with no moon.
Canon 5D Mark IV with 100-400 IS II.
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After a lifetime of mainly expressing myself with words, my postings here will mainly rely on images. They will speak for themselves to some extent, but I'll usually add a few comments of explanation. I've taken photographs for decades, since the 1950's, inspired in part by my father's photographic skill. Four years of photo assignments and quality darkroom time eventually gave way to decades of casual and family picture-taking. I re-immersed myself when I left film and turned to digital.