Sunday, November 21, 2010

Footpath Astronomy.

Time's winding down and today I had what will probably be among my last poison pork rolls (fanks Ma!), my last Johnston St. Fiesta (hipsters love foreign culture festivals!), and my last bowl of pho (from Hung Vuong 2 on Victoria St). As I was driving away from Victoria St., I saw something I've always wanted to participate in but never did for whatever reason.

On Nicholson St., a curious sign advertising *Footpath Astronomy* is present on clear nights, near a pub . 

I told Mich I was going to pull over and we were going to participate in it. Her reply, "WTF?! I've never seen this before in my life! This is kinda random!" We were met by Jack, who was nice and jovial, and showed us Jupiter with the naked eye and then down the telescope. It was awesome! 


 Looking at Jupiter (with bonus Jack in the frame)! Unfortunately, I didn't think to try and take a picture down the scope of the planet. I'm not sure if it actually works but I've done it with microscopes so it might have!

Mich's turn to be a hunchback (with another astronomy participant)!

On further questioning, Jack told us that about when he discovered his love for astronomy (high school), when he bought his first telescope (1985, in preparation for Halley's Comet), and recommended that we start off with buying an 8cm telescope or some binoculars to viewing the stars in the northern sky - I'd be able to see the Big and Little Dippers there! He said we couldn't see the moon because it was being obstructed by the pub next door, but when I suggested we could move all the gear around the corner, he apologetically said he didn't want to leave his camera and laptop on the street for people more enthusiastic for free goodies than the cosmos. Ah well.


And Mich's final words? "That was cool! I wanna stand on the footpath and tell people stuff I know when I'm old!"

2 comments:

SuBoo said...

Hey, that really IS very cool.

Matthew said...

yes taking photos down the eyepiece does work depending on how easy it is to set your camera on manual focus and shutter speed.

in fact I think the first commercially available CCDs were for astrophotography and not digital cameras!