I have always loved to look at the sky on a clear night. My dad used to show me the different constellations visible in the southern hemisphere. One easy to identify: Orion. I always look for that one on a clear night sky, just simply love to see those stars so so far away but still visible by the human eye. I wonder how they would see us if someone would live in one of them. The other easy to identify is the Cruz del Sur Constellation(Southern Cross). The one showing the sailors – and anyone feeling disoriented – where the South Cardinal Point is.
Many must have seen the alignment of some planets yesterday night, I couldn’t. Although there were some clear skies where I live, my sense of responsibility stopped me from going out at night, I have a cold at the moment. For those who saw it, it must have been amazing to see those planets that look like stars in the immensity of space. Just to think about it, makes me emotional.
Some years ago I had the opportunity to visit a famous observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, US. The Lowell Observatory. What an experience! Totally unforgettable!
Summer, lovely dark clear night. We could hardly see where we were guided to go. We were in a group of people but could hardly see their faces. The guide suddenly stopped. There was a telescope on the side of the way, we took turns and looked at the sky ….. sooooooo lovely!!
There were many stops on the way. Each of them spectacular.
From one of them, I could see a pulsar. From the Earth, a pulsar looks like a star that has a pulse, a rapid beat picked up only by radio telescopes, and I saw a group of them!!!
At another station, I saw Andromeda, the nearest galaxy to the Milky Way, I could not believe my eyes! My eyes, yes, with my own eyes, with all my short sighted and imperfect vision, there it was, a spiral shaped galaxy with only God knows how many stars/planets in it, in front of my humble eyes. Needless to say I felt like the smallest ant on Earth.
I also felt I could almost touch the Moon. That one was near, in our galaxy, in our Solar System, just 384,400 km from Earth. When looking at it using the telescope, I felt I could extend my arm and touch its surface and write my name on it.
How to forget such an amazing experience?
Last but not least, there was the meteorite! This was a piece of a meteorite from the Meteor Crater which is the best-preserved meteorite impact crater on Earth. It’s also known as Barringer Crater, in Arizona.
I would have loved to spend the whole night stargazing there but unfortunately, I had to leave and return to my little tiny world. I had to leave the starts at Lowell Observatory as Carl Sagan said: “In the vastness of space and the immensity of time”