Mt Dona Buang Victoria

[tnbk00 (Daniel)]

IIS'ers I was wondering if in the finer months anyone has done any observing from Mt Dona Buang just outside of Warburton.

I was up there last sat and it looked like it could be a good place in the warmer months, not o good in the winter months due to snow.

I would be curios as to what its like and if no one has gone up there for a squiz, would anyone be interested, when it gets a little warmer again?


Daniel

[dannat (Daniel)]

Daniel can you post a googlemap,sounds interesting - can you see much light pollution of Melb being high up?
daniel

[tnbk00 (Daniel)]

The link is here:
http://maps.google.com.au/maps?f=q&h...09407&t=p&z=14
Basically its the summit rd.

I am not sure what the LP would be like, it was daylight when I was there, but its quite high (according to the signage 1200m - higher than any point in England, Ireland or wales)

I might need to do a night drive up there. The facilities up there, imho would cater not too badly to astronomers. There is an inside area, electric bbq's and toilet facilities.

There are views of the city and basically all of melbourne, which could be the downside to it.

[Alchemy (Clive)]

i live a bit down the road... can see it from my observatory though. i think the gates are locked in the evening, you could contact the national parks people ( its the yarra ranges national park) A little walk from the gates to the summit

it would be darkish as no nearby housesetc, you will find the skyglow to the west a waste of time but the east north and south would be good.... much better than the burbs, you can seee the full swathe of the milky way naked eye easily on a ,moonless night.

you would need your own power supply.

if you wanted to do transit type astrophotography there are a couple of lower carparks outside the gates from memory , but your horizon isnt as good.

[sjastro]

I used to image from Mt Donna Buang in the mid to late nineties. At 1200m altitude seeing was excellent, there was some light pollution but from what I recall the visual limiting magnitude was around 6.0.

I wouldn't be surprised if the visual limiting magnitude is unchanged, Mt Donna Buang is sufficiently far away and more importantly higher than Melbourne's expanding light dome.

Back in those days of emulsion astrophotography and manual guiding, there were occasions when I would do 1 hr+ exposures stuck at the eyepiece in the dead of winter. Not a very pleasant experience.

The other issue was to explain my motives to the occasional police patrols in the area. Since none of them had ever heard of astrophotography, it must have been a very strange sight.

Regards

Steven
http://users.westconnect.com.au/~sjastro/small

[tnbk00 (Daniel)]

Hmm might have to give it a go when the weather gets more suited. I have slept up there before as a kid. So I guess I could always plan to get locked in, and camp out.....authorities permitting

[CometGuy]

Daniel,

I went up to nearby Lake Mountain which is higher at 1400+ Meters and the sky transparency (in December, 1990) was excellent. The problem with that area would be cloud though.

I also used to observe from Mt Macedon and near Kinglake, again in the early 90's, and I don't know what its like now. Kinglake was very much effected by Melbourne light pollution to the south although I remember seeing some nice aurora's there.

Terry