I swear I can feel the warm touch of its light on the back of my neck as I direct the Little Dipper out beyond the break wall and spin the bow up the West Channel.
This is exactly what I wanted a boat for, the freedom to slide out of the marina in the predawn darkness on nights when the moon is full, out on the blue-black back of Lake Superior searching for the high notes of the moon’s reflection on the water, like music for the eyes. I steer for the north end of the nearest island smiling at the thought of the alchemists who once set out to distill moonlight, swirling the light in huge silver bowls. But the mystery of the moon will not be condensed to anything as simple as chemical compounds or mathematical equations no matter how silvery the bowl. The shiver we feel at the sight of the moon rolling over a wild horizon is tied up in other, less objective things: in sounds half-heard on a windless night, in the brush of whiskers in tight places, and in what it is to be human in a world where some things cannot can’t be explained by the soulless calculations of science alone.
At the north end of the island, I spin the boat to face the moon now slowly setting over the hills of Bayfield.
At moments like that it is not so much about statistics — the 841 pounds of moon rocks brought back by Apollo astronauts, the -273 degree “nights” on the surface of the moon without the quilt of any appreciable atmosphere. I am a romantic. I see the world not in numbers but in beauty and on moonlit trips among the islands on the Little Dipper I steer a course, not by the nautical charts, but by the light of the moon dancing on the water, guiding me home.
— Jeff Rennicke (all photography by the author unless otherwise noted)
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I like to be at anchor with a clear view to the east on full moon nights. Watching the moon rise between the glistening water of Lake Michigan and stars beyond is transcendent.
I love the description - I have paddled in canoe country with the full reflection of the stars on a moonless night and sailed the Apostles when the blue moon cast its shadow. I think the romance of the universe comes on nights like this when we can see that the vast expanse of space is looking at us while we attempt to look at it.