Sierra Night

A crystal clear winter night at Lake Tahoe in Nevada. Winter stars in the northern hemisphere sky appear along the Milky Way. Sirius is in the middle and the prominent figure of constellation Orion, the Hunter, is on the right. Lake Tahoe is a large freshwater alpine lake in the Sierra Nevada mountain range. At 1645 ft (~ 500 m) deep its the the United State’s second-deepest lake (after Crater Lake in Oregon). From the photographer: “I was most pleased with the stillness of the lake and the incredible star reflections. I am not sure how often this happens, as the lake is large (over 21 miles across) and very deep.” © Wally Pacholka