The Eastern Sierra is famous for its awesome sunrises lighting up the 13,000 to 14,000 foot elevation peaks. I reasoned that a moonrise, being reflected sunlight, should light up the peaks just like a sunrise. I also reasoned that given the right location and time of year, I could capture the moonrise lighting up the peaks and include the milky way as part of the composition.
We had never backpacked into the Sabrina Basin, out of Bishop, California, so after a bit of research I found the perfect location for the shot, Hungry Packer Lake. This lake sits below Picture Peak and I was hoping to get a still night to capture the reflection of the peak and milky way in the lake. It is a 7 mile hike to the lake and in early July 2020, we had this special place all to ourselves. I used an App called Photopills to zero in on the exact night and time the Milky way would be in the saddle just below and to the left of Picture Peak. This shot was taken about midnight on July 8th, 2020. We were very fortunate that the wind we had experienced when we retreated to our tent at 10:00pm had subsided yielding a perfectly still lake for the reflection. I shot the moon lighting up the tops of the peaks (to the right of the image) just before it would be too light to see the milky way. Sometimes planning and luck work together and this was one of those special times.
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