Limerick Astronomy Club

Well,
after meeting up with Pere and The ASTER guys then Antonio at Fabra,
it's got me stirred to kick around for
ideas.
Thing is though,
it's grand to do this but do ye actually
want to?
Or if there is a meet up planned
do ye want the option to 'opt out'
or build in or book free days for each to
have the option to do thier own thing.

You have to be carefull to try and please
everyone but its hard to do & harder in
small groups.


That aside, I do think the club
presenting itself as it did in Barcelona
is a good thing.

so what could be researched & organised?

A few things in my mind at least;

Mt. Tiede in Tenerefe -
I'd done lots of groundwork on this 2 years
ago & I've a good contact there.
Visits to the working scopes can be arranged.
(accom would be the Hotel on Tede)

Galloway dark sky park in Scotland.
Im in contact with the pr for it.
& have spoken to the pro of the local club.
Rent a winnabego & get the ferry over?

Aurora trip?

TSE from boat off Iceland
or Faro Islands


Any more ideas?

well, theyre all good ideas.
I was talking to Michael Johnson, our resident world traveller, and he's thinking of going to Finland early next year, maybe February for an Aurora trip.
He's gonna look up the viability of it as a trip and come back to us.
The main difference with this trip compared to what you already mentioned above is that this would be an event trip, there is no gaurantee of seeing what you go for.

Galloway, you mean the starparty there yes ?
I think I'd only go if I was bringing the obsessionator with me, .
It would be a minimal expense trip, me thinks, a weekend away.
Weather is the obvious problem, bad if not worse then here.

Mt Teide is an idea thats been bouncing around for years now (Gran Canaria has been talked about alot in the 1990's) so it's a matter of when, not if.

The solar eclipse off Iceland /Faro is a difficult one, Faro gets worse weather then us, I often joke about a getting a trawler from Donegal and heading up. Going to Iceland would be nice, I'll contact the club in Iceland and see how theyre going to manage it, with a view to SAC copying them or tagging along with them.

There is also an eclipse in the mid atlantic on Nov3rd 2013, it hits landfall in Gabon near some wildlife reserve. Its one of these hybrid eclipses so I'll need to do some digging to see if its still total by the time it hits Africa.
check out
http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEgoogle/S ... oogle.html
at first glance, this seems like a far more viable option then the iceland/faro eclipse.
also, IT GIVES THE OPPERTUNITY TO OBSERVE SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE SKIES ASWELL !!

Cool. I was already onto the Icelandic Club.
If you want I can hand it over to you...
less work for me!

Dont mind who does it so long as its done, lets us know what they say when you get a reply.

Ya. I can post up the replies like before.
As for Galloway, I dont mean the starparty,
you can go anytime but the starparty is
not a bad idea.

Feck this place looks AWESOME!
http://www.sark.info/

And it's totally do-able:
Just a quick tot up if you went for
a week in September;
cork to jersey €139 return flight Aer Lingus.
jersey to sark €63 open return ferry
Camping 5 nights €40 (€8 per night)

€242!

looks like a nice place to go, what about bringing telescopes??, thats the question I'd have,
Having no cars is not a bonus there, if it were possible, id bring the big dob, but youd need transport on the island to move it around.

I'd be in widefield astrophotography heaven there!
But for scopes, big problem.
Thats where an 18" UC would shine
Actually, I must email the tourist 'board' there
back to see do any of the guesthouses have scopes.
(I say 'board' as theres only a tiny population on the island so the tourist officer is probably the local doctor - postmaster - shopkeeper etc )

Actually, for scopes, Galloway is the place to go.
A bunch of us rent one of these
http://www.gowinnebago.com/
stuff it with scopes and hit the trail..
Awesome.

looks good! I'd be on for this trip!

Galloway star camp 2011 is on 28th sept - 3rd oct.
http://www.galloway-star-camp.co.uk/camp.htm

Also lads - point i was trying to stress at the meeting about the burren is that
we should STRONGLY boast on the website about the burren - it is a WORLD CLASS DARK SKY LOCATION (and its ours!!!)


Dave - this link may be of use?
it lists The burren in it along with all the other excellent places
http://docs.darksky.org/Nightscape/Dark ... ations.pdf

Also - our limiting mag there is 7+
I checked this a few nights with star charts.
There a VERY FEW places near civisilation that offer this
http://www.darksky.org/assets/documents/is120.pdf

Ya I'm up for that Galloway
trip and that dark sky site on
the Isle of Sark looks F**kin Awesome...

Cheers Roy