I've always thought of this scene as being sunset, not dawn - it's so tranquil, so mellow, so meditative, and perhaps also because of the red/ochre shades which to me are more evening than morning - and I always just assumed that the water reflected the sky; however, looking at the card now, the water and sky do seem a distinctly different shade, as well as the presence, of course, of the darker, redder areas which we see on the land and the water but not on the sky.....
Water representing, in so many other cards, the Inner, our higher selves, I would take it to represent the same here, but while it's usually blue - intuitive, emotional - as we experience it on a day-to-day basis, here perhaps the man can sense the true greatness of that higher state - the alchemical gold, and the greatness of the voyage of discovery that leads to it.
But it's not coloured as pure gold, there are patches of a more earthy shade; perhaps he recognises that this is not an impersonal ideal but his own personal journey, based on his wisdom and coloured by his own experiences.............