Fast forward to Gunnison, Colorado where we have spent the last three summers. Guess what they have an observatory!! Click here to see the site. This place is run totally on volunteers and has been in existence since 2007 I believe. They now have some fairly fancy telescopes for viewing.
Imagine the nite sky in the Western Rockies in SouthWest Colorado. Many navy blue skies I'll tell ya. And the stars sparkled like diamonds
The local college has some nite classes that they call Wednesday at Western, well one of them was an astonomy lecture and visit to the observatory, fee $5. When I saw that I checked with some friends here and we quickly made a reserve since I figured these kind of things fill up fast.
Last nite was our lecture...................what a terrific experience. Professor was a tad geeky but then I kind of expected that of an astronomer.
The clouds cleared, all but a couple of wisps and low and behold there was Saturn in all its splendor includng the rings. Everyone that viewed walked away from the scope say WOW!!
If you would like to partake in some amateur star gazing check out Skymaps.com You'll print out the map calendar and wander out in the nite time sky and see some pretty amazing sites. Best viewed on a pretty clear sky, no clouds, and when the moon is not real bright.
It was a wonderful nite and I will definitely go back because they have public viewing on Friday nites.
4 comments:
Cool, Saturn is quite impressive to see it in a telescope. We saw it in Bryce. Great, do they do this regularly? Sound fun. I'm geeky
After this class they start friday nite viewing to the public for $5............yes you can be geeky!!!
Profs should be geeky. That's part of their charm. My daughter aspires to be a geeky professor.
How awesome that must have been?! I think I'll ask Santa for a telescope. Nothing like the winter sky here with all the sparkly stars.
Einstein and Richard Feynman knew how to have fun AND be geeky. I design and webmaster the GVO website, attended Cattlemen's days on TETWP night this year and usually spend my time shredding steep powder drops on my snowboard all winter in addition to managing the Crested Butte Farmers Market all summer. It's the thin atmosphere - helps the star gazing and multi-tasking to boot. Disclaimer: I wasn't at the observatory last week. Thanks for visiting our observatory! You're welcome back anytime - Kevin McGruther
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