Dark Skies 2016 Astrocamp, Rotunda Pass

Amateur astronomers from Máramarossziget/Sighetu Marmației organized the Dark Skies 2016 Astronomy Camp at the Rotunda Pass. The area is one of the last remaining dark spots in the EU, so dark that the clouds appear to be dark brown/black.

The camp being meant mainly for visual observers, had no electricity, just a generator run in the evening, during the dinner to recharge the gadgets. It is the owner’s fault we had no running water at all, an issue I would have imagined for the savanna/desert in Namibia, not the Romanian countryside with a long estabilished cabin with as much water that my jacket got wet in a clear night. So much for the level of civilisation and decency. (tovább…)