The Earth's Shadow and the Belt of Venus

I just knew there had to be a name for it.

There are so many spectacular sunrises and sunsets in the desert that sometime you just have to turn away, and if you do, this is what you'll often see, opposite the sunrise or the sunset, a band of blue bleeding into a band of pink.

The band of blue is actually the shadow of the earth in the atmosphere as the sun rises or sets. The pink is called the "belt of Venus" or the "anti-twilight arch." At daybreak the shadow of the earth sets and at day's end it rises into darkness.