Moonlit Lenticular, Mount Rainier NP

Moonlit Lenticular, Mount Rainier NP

I took some time after work on Tuesday to make a trip down to Mount Rainier. I'd visited on Saturday to do a scouting trip to find a location in the northwest corner of the park (closest to home) where I might be able to shoot a sunset. I aimed for Spray Park, but decided I didn't want to hike miles along in the dark after sunset and, instead, found a small little roadside pull-out where there were nice, unobstructed views of Mount Rainier. This was my destination for Tuesday's sunset.

The skies were a bit hazy, and the sunset colors a bit faint and uneven, a lenticular cloud formation made up for it. After the sunset faded and a last band of alpenglow formed on the lower altitudes of Rainier the moon crossed the horizon, right about in the bottom left of this photograph. Over the next 30 minutes it rose parallel to the eastern (here, on the left) slope and eventually disappeared behind the lenticular cloud.

This particular shot was taken just as the moon began to appear again above the lenticular. I particularly liked the thing sliver of moon in this shot, more so that with it fully behind the cloud, or fully revealed above it. What I'd particularly hoped to see was back-lighting of the cloud from the moon, which happened to a noticeable degree around its perimeter. The moon actually briefly appeared, disappeared, and reappeared during this exposure as the clouds changed, and as such two distinct slivers of the moon can actually be seen. The western skies weren't yet fully darkened and some of that indirect light contributed to the light on the western (right) slope.

It was a fairly photographic evening at Rainier, despite not being what I anticipated shooting. There should be several more photos in my subsequent posts.

Nikon D90 | Nikon 105mm Micro | f/11 | 30s | ISO100 | Tripod

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