Starry, Starry Night

Saturday, Oct 21…

Greg left me to walk or read (less than 100 pages left in Exodus – it’s been a long haul but worth the effort) while he took the MH to a nearby dump site. Then we headed north on 17 to Flagstaff. Lots of haze for the first hour or so, and more traffic than expected (but not enough to be an issue). Our home for the next couple nights is Black Bart’s RV Park, Steakhouse, Saloon & Musical Review. While a steak dinner, song & dance sounded great, so was the price - we decided to have our own steak for dinner and then visit Lowell Observatory. I can't remember ever going to an observatory before and was curious.

More on that adventure in a bit. First a couple travel shots...

Limited view at times.

Other times it's on and on and on...

Even with the haze, it's a fantastic view - so many different elevations.

Despite reading all the online info and schedules, we weren’t sure what to expect at Lowell. (And, I realized quickly after arriving, I’d been confusing observatory with planetarium, so what I found was very different from even vague expectations.) First of all, I was surprised at how many folks were there. It’s open ‘til 10pm, and there was a steady stream of people. Our first stop was an outdoor telescope where we could look at Saturn. OK, honestly, I was disappointed (and felt guilty/ungrateful because everyone ahead of us was raving). 

I saw a small white sphere sliced by a thin white wiggly saucer. I expected color and evidence of multiple rings (which probably the wiggle indicated).  We moved into another line to go inside a small observatory (there are 3 or 4 of these) and see a twin star that I can’t remember the name of. From Earth, this just looks like a regular star, but I could clearly see 2 white shimmery dots. In a 3rd observatory we saw a star cluster, which looked like a dandelion puff. That was my fave. And, even with Saturn’s pasty image, I realized I was actually seeing another planet with my own eyes, and that’s pretty darn cool. 

This Saturn chandelier - w/ color & multiple rings - hangs in the Rotunda Museum.

Greg occasionally still uses a traditional slide rule. He was incredibly impressed w/ this 60' version (which apparently either makes it more precise or allows more uses - maybe both). It isn't stretched out, though. I believe each section rotates on a spindle so the calculations can be read. 

It was getting pretty cold outside, so we went into one of the lecture halls and learned all about comets. (The presenter even made a comet out of dry ice, water, mashed potato flakes (amino acid) and fine dirt.) Then we trekked across to the Rotunda Museum (pics below) and listened to another grad student (UNAz –our lecturer was in his 5th year of astrophysics). I honestly only understood only about 20% of his talk, but I did learn stuff and I wasn’t bored (well, once in a while). Overall, it was a great evening - very different than all the historical stuff we usually do, and - even without the telescopes, the sky was amazing. 

Postscript...  The observatory is above Flagstaff, up on Mars Hill. Looking down at the city (while waiting for a turn at one of the telescopes), I realized I was looking at old Route 66. The photo is fuzzy, but still worth including.

The vertical center glow is headlights on Rte 66.

And the final balloon I'd like to share...

Not yet ascended, but always a crowd favorite.