Quark
18-04-2009, 01:15 PM
Hi All,
Last night 17/04/2009 I was involved with the National Parks & Wildlife Starry Starry Night astronomy presentation at Kinchega National Park near Menindee.
The presentation was given on a bitumen helipad on top of a sand hill overlooking Emu Lake, a dry lake. One of the local aboriginal elders gave a talk on the stories her people told about various star formations to the 30 odd locals and visitors, assembled on this sand hill in the remote far west of NSW. She spoke of the meaning to her people of the Seven Sisters and the belt of Orion, the legends that explain how those stars came to be, it was most interesting to listen to this quite different perspective on the night sky.
Following on I gave a general talk on astronomy while waiting for the sky to darken and then conducted a tour with my laser to entertain the group while they waited for their turn to observe through my 12” Lightbridge.
There was a good mix of age groups from children to retired tourists that were taking the time to see the outback. We looked at all of the showpiece objects of the southern sky, our local ABC radio rural reporter hovered around the scope recording the various exclamations as each person came to the eyepiece to see a great star cluster or nebulae or colourful carbon star or a far away Galaxy. It really was a magical night and I saved the best to last, Saturn.
It looked absolutely stunning, everyone that looked went straight back to the end of the line to have another look, most could not believe that a point of light in the night sky could be transformed into this stunningly detailed vision rapidly floating through the field of view.
Even as I packed up there were still some standing around firing questions, obviously quite taken with what they had experienced. This was a first for our local National Parks and due to the success of this night they are planning more of the same for the future.
Regards
Trevor
Last night 17/04/2009 I was involved with the National Parks & Wildlife Starry Starry Night astronomy presentation at Kinchega National Park near Menindee.
The presentation was given on a bitumen helipad on top of a sand hill overlooking Emu Lake, a dry lake. One of the local aboriginal elders gave a talk on the stories her people told about various star formations to the 30 odd locals and visitors, assembled on this sand hill in the remote far west of NSW. She spoke of the meaning to her people of the Seven Sisters and the belt of Orion, the legends that explain how those stars came to be, it was most interesting to listen to this quite different perspective on the night sky.
Following on I gave a general talk on astronomy while waiting for the sky to darken and then conducted a tour with my laser to entertain the group while they waited for their turn to observe through my 12” Lightbridge.
There was a good mix of age groups from children to retired tourists that were taking the time to see the outback. We looked at all of the showpiece objects of the southern sky, our local ABC radio rural reporter hovered around the scope recording the various exclamations as each person came to the eyepiece to see a great star cluster or nebulae or colourful carbon star or a far away Galaxy. It really was a magical night and I saved the best to last, Saturn.
It looked absolutely stunning, everyone that looked went straight back to the end of the line to have another look, most could not believe that a point of light in the night sky could be transformed into this stunningly detailed vision rapidly floating through the field of view.
Even as I packed up there were still some standing around firing questions, obviously quite taken with what they had experienced. This was a first for our local National Parks and due to the success of this night they are planning more of the same for the future.
Regards
Trevor