The Straight Wall

The Straight Wall is the long, light streak in the upper right of this photo. It's a trick: it's really the Straight Gentle Slope, but the hard light of sunrise and sunset on the airless Moon makes even slight elevations and depressions look stark. Here it's the last light of a lunar day. Above the Straight "Wall" is the ruined crater Deslandres and its complicated terrain; at far lower right is night-filled crater Alphonsus. You can seen its curved eastern rim, a few high mountains on its westen rim reach high enough to catch the evening sun; and in its center the very top of its central peak lights up like a star in the last daylight it will see for two weeks.