Moonrises - Al Hann - Arizona 2008

As many of you already know, I always schedule these trips around the phase of the Moon. For this trip, the Moon would be Full on Tuesday, Oct 14th. On that day, the Moon rose in the east as the Sun was setting in the west. Working backward from the 14th, the Moon would rise ~30min earlier each preceding day. The point here is that the earlier in the afternoon the Moon rises, the higher the sun is in the sky (and the brighter the sky is overall). The bright sky tends to wash out the view of the Moon. These images illustrate the this effect.

Another consideration is where along the horizon (i.e. at what compass point) will the Moon rise on a given day. Using the 14th again, the Moon rose at about 75deg (ENE). Working backwards from the 14th again, the Moon rose ~9deg further south each preceding day. So during my travels I also scouted out views looking the same direction of the moonrise for a given day. Unfortunately, I did not find a good locations near Flagstaff to shoot moonrise on the 14th. But I did manage to get a few good shots on the preceding days.

	Sat, Oct 11 - Moonrise 1h 45min before sunset Sunset Crater - Sunset Crater Volcano NP I just happened to be in the right place at the right time for this shot. There is a nice pullout just inside the access road to the NP. I stopped to take some shots of the crater, and then checked my moonrise time/direction notes for that day. Moonrise would be in a little over 1hr. I was pleasantly surprised when the compass showed the Moon would be rising within the crater! So I got back in the SUV and toured further into the park, returning to the pullout in time to get this shot. The sky was so bright at the time that it took a far amount of tweaking to bring the Moon out.
	Sun, Oct 12 - Moonrise 1hr 15min before sunset Cathedral Rock - Sedona/RedRocks Area This was taken on my 2nd foray down to Red Rocks. I had found this location while touring around Red Rocks SP on the 1st trip. It was a nice spot at the crest of a small hill along the unpaved section of Red Rocks Loop Road. This shot only required a little tweaking to bring out the Moon.
	Another Oct 12th shot zoomed in a little further.
	Mon, Oct 13 - Moonrise 45min before sunset Painted Desert - Petrified Forest NP In all of my travels around Flagstaff on the previous 4 days, I could not find a good view in the direction of moonrise on Oct 13th. There really weren't any good spots down in the Red Rocks area either. So I said the heck with it, and drove the 110+mi east on I-40 to Petrified Forest NP (and of course, 110+mi back to the hotel room in Flagstaff!). I thought about saving this drive for the next day (best moonrise time of the trip). But then I realized that I would have had to be in the NP for a little while after sunset. That was a serious no-no (as mentioned earlier, the park is locked down tight between sunset/sunrise). By this day, the Moon was bright and clear enough on its own.