Folklore, stories and songs often use the moon as a metaphor, a lesson or just a description: a pale moon rises, as dark as the moonless night, beneath a crescent moon, howling at the moon, witches and the moon, man in the moon, “Blue Moon,” “Paper Moon,” “Everyone’s Gone to the Moon” and “Moon over Bourbon Street.”
Even the Bee Gees got into the act with the four-line chorus of “We fly rings around the moon” in the song “Rings Around the Moon.”
Sorry, guys. We’ll leave that act to the astronauts and astronomical phenomena.
Recently I wandered out on the deck to see what was happening. My timing was excellent: There was a most impressive — and huge — ring around the moon.
In order to have a ring, moonlight (reflected sunlight) must bend (refract) through (usually) hexagonal columnar-shaped ice crystals in cirrus clouds 25,000 to 30,000 feet above the Earth.
Those clouds of ice crystals are also called diamond dust, and they can exist in any season.
Moon rings are almost always the same size (22 degrees of the sky) because the typical ice crystals refract the light at a 22-degree angle, and most often seen during a full or near-full moon.
How much is 22 degrees? If you put your thumb on the horizon and reach out your little finger, you’re covering almost a quarter (about 20 degrees) of the overhead sky.
But rings are not the only phenomena connected to the moon. Here are a few:
Corona: Although these are commonly (and mistakenly) called rings around the moon, they’re much smaller, a fuzzy blanket only a few degrees in diameter.
Moon pillars: Pale vertical shafts of light can appear above and below the moon as it rises or sets. Again, it involves ice crystals, but ones that have a different axis than those creating halos. An axis is an imaginary line that helps define the face of a crystal.
Moon dogs: Refractions can also lead to moon dogs, bursts of light off the moon’s edges.
Moon (or lunar) rainbow or moon bow: These rare pale bows might not even be seen in this area (does anyone know?). It will be in the sky opposite the moon where rain is falling, and the moon will be low in the sky.
Winter recreation
Although many state parks have been closed or face possible closure due to budget cuts, more than 100 parks will open daily for winter recreation.
Twenty-one parks are closed until March or April, and five are open only on weekends and holidays.
The winter schedule (www.parks.wa.gov/parkschedule/) includes dates of campground, day-use areas, and watercraft launch closures and reopenings.
Try something different when you stay overnight. There are cabins at Bay View, Camano Island, Cama Beach, Kitsap Memorial and Wallace Falls state parks; yurts at Cape Disappointment, Grayland Beach and Seaquest; and vacation houses at Millersylvania, Fort Flagler, Fort Worden and Moran.
All can be reserved year-round.
State parks that accept year-round camping reservations are Cape Disappointment, Deception Pass, Dosewallips, Grayland Beach, Ike Kinswa, Kitsap Memorial, Ocean City, Pacific Beach, Steamboat Rock and Wallace Falls.
Reservations may be made online at www.parks.wa.gov or by calling 888-226-7688. Reservations for Fort Worden and Fort Townsend state parks may be made by calling 360-344-4400.
Columnist Sharon Wootton, co-author of “Off the Beaten Path Washington,” can be reached at 360-468-3964 or songandword@rockisland.com.
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