Lunar Eclipse

Overnight this past night, the earth experienced a partial lunar eclipse.  The full moon was the "Beaver Moon", and the eclipse was the longest partial eclipse to occur in the past 580 years.  I certainly was not going to miss this once in a lifetime phenomenon!

I set my alarm clock for 1:15 AM, but also knowing that I would have plenty of time to observe and photograph since the eclipse would last a very long time.  Ordinarily I would have had to drive a ways out of town to do that, but since the moon was very high in the sky, I just went out into my back yard.  

The thin hazy clouds were coming and going, but fortunately by the time of totality, the sky had cleared.  The photo above was taken around 2:20 AM.  It was a pleasant (for me) 40 degrees outside, so I sat in a folding chair on the lawn.

I have seen many lunar eclipses, but this one was interesting because the moon was very small and almost straight above me.  I was  more interested in observing a clear night sky with the constellation Orion in full view, the stars Sirius and Polaris, and the Pleiades towards the upper right of the moon, among others.  There was also the occasional shooting star.  Very magical.  

So I sat in a meditative state in the chilly air until about 3 AM.  There's nothing like communing with nature on a dark and quiet night!