213 a
The second live TV transmission from the spacecraft on the third day of its journey toward the Moon offered to the viewers on Earth their spectacular first live view of the Planet. Apollo 8 was traveling at about 3,254 feet per second, some 175,000 nautical miles from Earth

055:10:28 Lovell: What you’re seeing, Mike, is a - Houston, what you are seeing is the Western Hemisphere. Looking at the top [left in this image] is the North Pole; in the center - just lower to the center is South America - all the way down to Cape Horn. I can see Baja California and the southwestern part of the United States. [...] And we can also see the white, bright spot of the subsolar point on the light side of the Earth.
055:11:28 Collins (Mission Control): Roger. Could you give us some ideas about the colors [...]?
055:12:17 Lovell: Okay. For colors, the waters are all sort of a royal blue; clouds, of course, are bright white; the reflection off the Earth is - appears much greater than the Moon. The land areas are generally a brownish - sort of dark brownish to light brown in texture. [...]
055:17:51 Anders: I hope that everyone enjoys the picture that we are taking of themselves. [Pause.] How far away from Earth now, Jim, about?
055:18:03 Collins: We have you about 180,000 [nautical miles].
055:18:11 Anders: You are looking at yourselves at 180,000 miles out in space. [Pause.]
055:18:22 Lovell: Mike, what I keep imagining is, if I’m a - some lonely traveler from another planet, what I think about the Earth at this altitude, whether I think it’d be inhabited or not.
055:18:31 Collins: Don’t see anybody waving; is that what you are saying?
055:18:36 Lovell: I was just kind of curious whether I would land on the blue or the brown part of the Earth.
055:18:44 Anders: You better hope that we land on the blue part.

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The photograph was taken by Anders with the 250mm telephoto lens from about 326,000 km out in space and about 62,500 km from the Moon.

“A view of the Western hemisphere from the Apollo 8 spacecraft. The Sunset terminator runs from eastern Brazil to northeastern United States. A large area of the U.S. and Mexico, from Baja California to the Mississippi Valley, is cloud-free. South America is at center, with clouds covering all but the Andes Mountains along the west coast. The Antarctic ice cap is also visible” (original NASA caption for the photograph).

055:28:55 Collins (Mission Control): You’re 10 minutes from the Moon’s sphere of influence.
055:29:04 Borman: Okay. Good.
055:33:00 Public Affairs Officer (Mission Control): [...] The spacecraft now 176,000 [nautical] miles [326,000 km] from Earth. Its velocity, in relation to the Earth, is 3,265 feet per second [995 m/s]. This is Apollo Control, Houston.
055:33:28 Borman: Houston, Apollo 8. Returning to the PTC (Passive Thermal Control) mode. [...]
055:38:00 Public Affairs Officer (Mission Control): [...] The Apollo 8 has passed the - into the Moon’s Sphere of Influence; and quite literally this is a historic landmark in space flight because, for the first time, a crew is literally out of this world. They are under the influence of another celestial body, the Moon, from which the Earth - 33,820 straight line nautical miles [62,500 km].