New Moon Rising

Just a few minutes ago, I was outside with our dogs in the early morning twilight, and spotted this beautiful new moon. You may have to enlarge the photo to spot it!

We live in a location that's close to ideal for watching new moons, which are the thinnest when the moon is very close to the sun. Here we have clear skies nearly every morning, very little man-made “light pollution”, and a nice little mountain range to block the sun in the morning. My view this morning took perfect advantage of this setup – most of the glare (caused by Mies scattering) from the morning sun is being blocked by the mountains you see at the bottom of the photo, and the moon contrasts very nicely with the still-dark sky above.