The moon has no light of its own. The light seen from the moon is a reflection of the sun. The shape of the reflected light varies as the Earth orbits around the sun. This can be useful for finding direction at night once you understand how this works. When it is a crescent moon, it is straightforward.
Although the example above is for the Northern Hemisphere (a significant portion of land is here), it also works if you are in the Southern Hemisphere.
This navigational method works because the sun moves across the sky from east to west. Since the moon reflects the sun’s light, its bright side will be ‘pointing’ to the direction of the sun, or approximately east or west.
When the moon moves away from the sun’s glare and out of the earth’s shadow, the moon reflects light from the right side and waxes to become a full moon. The right portion of the moon is continually growing (i.e., if the right side is dark, the moon is getting darker; if the right side is lit, the moon is growing lighter). After the full moon, it starts to wane or lose shape and reflects light as a sliver on the left side.
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Good stuff. I've printed this off and will take it into the mountains to see how it correlates with Southern Hemisphere data.
If one know the face of the Moon, he may use that to tell its direction. It rolls across the sky from east to west, clockwise if one be north of the Tropic of Capricorn, & anticlockwise of one be South of the Tropic of Cancer. Thus, one may see if it be in the ESE, or the ENE, or whatever. The rises with its east face, & sets with its west face. Ignore the telescope gazers' directions, changed to suit them, in 1961.