The Pink Full Moon...

 

No, that is not a woman's undergarment from the subsidiary of Victoria's Secret (Pink).  April 1st at 7:12 pm is the peak of the current full moon.  I tried for it Tuesday night, and there was a solid over cast; but it is nice and clear on Wednesday, the first.  No fooling.

Despite the name, the Pink Moon will not actually appear pink. The name comes from the early spring bloom of creeping phlox, a wildflower native to eastern North America.  This Paschal Moon marks the first Full Moon of spring and is used to determine the date of Easter.

April’s Full Moon has religious significance as well. In Christianity, it’s known as the Lenten Moon if it’s the last Full Moon of winter (before the spring equinox) or the Paschal Full Moon if it’s the first ecclesiastical Full Moon of spring (after the equinox).  Yep, this is a "spring moon."

Here's how it looked as it came up over South Mountain...

 That is shot with the same camera and lens I use for just the moon.  If you expose to be able to see any of the mountain in the foreground, the moon is over-exposed.  Yes, your eye will see more detail in it, but the solid white look of the moon is a limitation of how the camera can see it.

And, then, taken a short time later, with the camera set for manual exposure...

 The slight color you see is not the "pink" but seeing the moon through more of the atmosphere since the image was captured when the moon was just a bit above the horizon.  For those keeping track, the exposure was made at ISO 1600, f11, 1/800th sec.  I keep the shutter speed reasonably fast so I can handhold the camera with the zoom lens (50 - 210mm).

And, no, you can't see the 4 NASA astronauts who are on their way to circle the moon.  Pretty exciting endeavor.