Moon is almost in the middle on his way to be a Full Moon, so many interesting features come up from the shadow near the terminator line. Between Sinus Asperitatis (Bay of Roughness – top part of the first picture) and Mare Nectaris (Sea of Nectar) there are few prominent craters. The first one from the top is Teophilus – large impact crater. It is 101km large in diameter and 4400m deep. Its rim has terraced inner surface, that shows indication of landslips. Central mountain is 1400m high with four separate summits.
Below and to the left there is Cyrillus crater. It is smaller and older than Teophilus, so this latter one intrudes its rim. The floor of Cyrillus is relatively flat and contains reduced central hill and considerable crater Cyrillus A. Slightly northeast to its center three rounded mountains rise to about 1000m above the crater floor: Cyrillus Alpha, Delta and Eta. Little below and to the right of these hills there is barely visible Rima Cyrillus.
When you go even lower there is Catherina impact crater. Among these three craters this one is the most ancient. Its rim is heavily worn and irregular and the floor is relatively flat but rugged.
Small crater to the left of Catherina is Tacitus – its interior surfaces are terraced. Below tacitus to the left there starts the long crater chain called Catena Abulfeda. And Tacitus is also the end of the ridge called Rupes Altai.
To the left and above the picture center there is small, but well defined crater Kant. Its inner walls have higher albedo than surrounding surface. Near by crater center there is low central rise. To the right and above the Kant there is Mons Penck – mountain promontory that has diameter at the base about 30km and climbs up to altitude 4000m.
At the center of second picture there is Rille Ariadaeus – over 300km long and it is thought to have been formed when a section of the Moon’s crust sank down between two parallel fault lines. It is relatively young lunar formation.
Above the rille there is Julius Caesar – lave flooded crater with low, irregular and heavily worn wall. To the left there is small Sosigenes crater and nearby smaller Sosigenes A crater. Both have almost perfectly round and bowl-like shapes. At the right part of picture in the middle there is Arago crater and above it barely visible dome – Arago Alpha. In the right bottom corner two craters: Ritter and Sabine. There is only a few kilometers valley between these two craters. Once they believed to be volcanic calderas, but eventually it turned out they are impact craters with uplift floor. In the bottom there is old D’Arrest crater, and to the left coming out from shadow two large craters – Agrippa (upper) and Godin (lower).
To the left of Julius Casear there is Boscovich crater – almost completely eroded away with subsequent impacts. Another old crater remnant is Tempel crater – to the right of Agrippa (bottom and little left from picture center). Its rim has been eroded, indented and reshaped with subsequent impacts and lava flows.
Clear skies!