In the July/August 2013 issue of SkyNews magazine, I took a break from specific stargazing locales in my Wilderness Astronomer column to recommend the top 5 “killer apps” – figuratively and literally – for stargazing in the great outdoors.

As promised, here below – some additional information on how to find and use these game-changing pieces of astronomical gear:

Star Walk app

Here’s the app…and here’s how to activate its red “night vision” mode

More augmented-reality stargazing apps

GPS starfinders

More on Celestron’s SkyScout “personal planetarium”

Travel scopes

SkyWatcher’s 5.1″ collapsible “mini-Dobsonian”

Edmund Scientific’s classic “Astroscan” scope-in-a-bowel

Image stabilized binoculars

Canon’s astronomy-proven line of IS binocs available in Canada

Nikon’s line of image stabilizer binoculars

OR…make your own image stabilizer out of some scrap wood…

Using your own camera for night-sky photography

If you have a digital SLR camera (and even just a point & shoot, in some cases) you can take pictures of the night sky…Here’s a quick intro to how.

No stranger to servicing the desires of sky-minded folks, Canon also makes a line of “astro-optimized” DSLR cameras – While most will set you back enough to warrant their own insurance policy, the effect is impressive AND Canon recently released an “astro-modified” version of its more modest 60D

In the May/June 2013 issue of Sky News magazine, I write in my Wilderness Astronomer column about a dark sky preserve that never-was.

At times, Ontario Parks calls it a “Provincial Park“…at other times, it’s a “Signature Site“. For clarity, we’ve called it “Kawartha Highlands Provincial Park” in the magazine.)

Official or not, Kawartha Highlands is a dark sky locale well-worth travelling to…

…As promised at the end of the magazine column, here are some more resources to help you enjoy (or just learn about) this wonderful, little-known wilderness stargazing site:

• Buckhorn Observatory (on the edge of the park)
• Dark sky map of the area
• First Nations star stories from the area
• Kawartha Highlands camping information
• Non-camping accommodations near the park
• Restaurants (in Buckhorn)
• Detailed zoomable map of the park (click on “Map” at “Map/Satellite” at upper-left to toggle labels)

More:

• Public viewing dates, events, and other 2013 programming at the Bluewater Outdoor Education Centre
• You can also see some of the bonus images the column may have directed you throughout this page

But that all changed when Gordon’s Park on Manitoulin Island and Bruce Peninsula National Park were granted dark sky preserve status – in 2008 and 2009,

respectively – by the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada (RASC.)

In addition to on-site accommodations, dining facilities and other amenities, both of these parks sport some of the darkest accessible skies in Southern Ontario.

This past November, the Bluewater Outdoor Education Centre joined Gordon’s and The Bruce to became the third dark sky preserve within roughly 100 km of two others….

…You can read more about the area in the March/April 2013 issue of Sky News: The Canadian Magazine of Astronomy & Stargazing (available at fine bookstores, Shoppers Drug Mart and Walmart)

All photos on this page were taken by and are courtesy of John Hlynialuk

Views under the dome will eventually include photorealistic horizons from many of Canada’s dark sky preserves, which Peter has been busy taking panoramas at this summer.

The dome features custom 3D flythroughs of the universe, a tribute to Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield’s upcoming mission to command the International Space Station, and custom photorealistic horizons, including the outskirts of Peterborough, Ontario, our main educational region (which you can see in our “highlight” collage (below.)

• More on our presentations
• More on our presenters
• In the media

Educators, groups, institutions and individuals interested in booking this portable facility can call or email co-presenter PeterMcMahon for further inquiries and/or to book a show:
bookings@peterboroughplanetarium.com /905.885.9471

Thanks to Stefanie Hamilton and the rest of the Jasper Park Lodge staff for putting me up for two weeks during year two of Dark Skies month here.

Over the last two years, Fairmont has shown tremendous faith and generosity in sponsoring both the Jasper Dark Sky Festival and myself as Jasper’s Sky Guy In Residence.

Tonight, I had the pleasure of working with about a dozen JPL staff members (in Jasper Dark Sky Preserve, “JPL” stands for Jasper Park Lodge – not the Jet Propulsion Lab, of NASA-fame) to walk them through the basics of using the Lodge’s large 12.5″ telescope, as well as show them around the skies in the world’s largest dark sky preserve.

Thanks to Sage (again, coolest name in Jasper) and all the other staff who gave the telescope a whirl, as well as Matt for sharing his astronomical knowledge (and super-powerful green laser pointer – holy lightsaber!)

For those interested in downloading some of the images of our stargazing session, here’re two pics of all of us and the Milky Way rising over the JPL canoe docks.

I’ve also included two shots I took afterwards, from outside our room and down on one of the sun docks down the hill from our home for the next week or so.

Telescope’s back in the main lobby – Thanks for a great night…Clear skies, guys!

Thanks to Michael and Paul from Sundog Tours in Jasper for bringing me in, Kevin, who shepherded me through my first bus tour, the Sundog tour staff, and everyone who came out to take a look through the scopes.
Cleak skies, guys!

Peter

After sorting out the details and doing some last-minute promo, I was off to the Rockies to wrangle some crowds of skygazers in cattle country. The hook: We’re under some of the darkest skies in the Canadian Rockies (the southern end of Jasper’s Icefields Parkway being the darkest) among one of the most beautiful tourist destinations in Western Canada…

…AND we just happened to get a week straight of perfectly clear, dry skies during a new moon.

A stellar resort town

From seeing the Milky Way in the middle of Waterton’s Town Site campground to watching the International Space Station pass over Waterton Lake and the park’s iconic Prince of Wales Hotel, the heavens didn’t disappoint:

A Thursday crowd of 60 at the Crandell Mountain Campground and a Friday group of 120 folks in town (not to mention a few hundred who saw the Sun projected onto an easel on the main street by the local ice cream parlour during the day) got to try out the latest stargazing gear, from GPS starfinders and iPad apps to image-stabilized binoculars and portable camping telescopes.

A joint dark sky vacation destination?

Visitors who drive through the park gates this summer will get the current season’s park newsletter/paper with a front page headline article about the park pursuing a dark sky designation along with the NPS’s Glacier National Park, which Waterton butts-up against at the Alberta/Montana border.

If the designation goes ahead – anywhere from months to years from now – the area would be the world’s first “cross-border” dark sky area.

Where to go, what to do

Whether or not that becomes a reality, I will most likely be doing a future Wilderness Astronomer column on the area in a 2013 or 2014 issue of Sky News magazine (the list of new, unreported, or up & coming dark sky areas in Canada is so large that I’m more-or-less booked-up for locations to write on through 2013.)

Meanwhile, if you’re in the area, be sure to check out the skies out on the lake or at the Crandall Mountain Campground’s waste disposal parking lot (which is basically a gravel turnaround with an amazing view.)

Places to stay include any of the hotels or motels as well as the Parks campgrounds or – if the park is full – accommodations in nearby Pincher Creek to the north.

Places to eat that I HIGHLY recommend include Pearl’s for breakfast (try the Orange Ya’ Happy french toast or Happy Hiker breakfast sausage & egg wrap – among the best I have had anywhere) and the “world-famous” Zumm’s fried chicken.

Also, be sure to take a cruise of Lake Waterton and if you’re not staying at the Prince of Wales, you can still go there by taking in a meal.

*** SKIP TO RESOURCES BELOW ***

Because of our location in this migratory bird-watching haven, we ended up with the added treat of seeing thousands of swallows, warblers, and other species flit occasionally in front of our telescope views.

The park is so far south, members of the Windsor Centre have successfully photographed the southern-hemisphere star cluster Omega Centauri from Point Pelee.

It’s also the only place anywhere near Windsor/Detroit where you can see the Milky Way.

After the Sun & Venus had set in this avian & astronomy eco-preserve, we took in fine telescope views of Mars and Saturn, including the ringed planet’s giant moon Titan (above) while a seagull transits the sun with Venus, June 5 (below)

Here are some of the local gear shops, restaurants, and accommodations I didn’t have time to mention in the magazine:

EVENTS

Monthly stargazing events in Point Pelee for 2012/2013

http://www.pc.gc.ca/eng/pn-np/on/pelee/activ/sky-ciel.aspx

BIRD-RELATED CONSTELLATIONS

http://www.escience.ca/blog/2012/04/23/spring-birdwatching-in-the-night-sky/

SOUTHERN-SKY DEEP-SPACE OBJECTS AS SEEN FROM POINT PEELE

http://www.escience.ca/blog/2012/07/11/dark-sky-spotlight-canadas-gateway-to-the-southern-sky/

FOOD

By far, my personal favourite find in the area isn’t a fish place, but Leamington’s Roy Thai, one of Ontario’s tastiest Thai menus, by-far.

For freshly-caught fish – the signature local dining experience here – check out the legendary Freddy’s or Paula’s Fish Place.

ACCOMMODATIONS

The stand-out local experience is Point Pelee’s Seacliffe Inn

If full, there are two other hotel/motel chain alternatives nearby:

Comfort Inn, Leamington

Days Inn, Leamington

SHOPPING (astronomy and birding gear)

Pelee Wings Nature Store is perhaps the closest telescope and binocular store in the world to a dark sky preserve. They also sell kayaks.

http://www.peleewings.ca

(Above: Venus transits the setting sun behind the birds of Point Pelee as onlookers observe through filtered telescopes on Lake Erie. All photos by Peter McMahon from Point Pelee National Park, Ontario)

June 14, I had the fun task of demonstrating some of the kids science experiments I’m offering for kids who sign up for one of my 2012 Summer Discovery day camps at the Peterborough Museum and Archives. (00:09 – 01:44)

At the same time, I also demoed some of the portable stargazing gear we’ll be using (02:12 – 10:14) which you can also use during a car, shoe, or canoe-based camping trip during the Awesome Astro Adventure camp.

Click to check out all the goodies, as we used them for views of the Moon and (filtered) views of the Sun.

Also, here’s some footage (04:06 – 06:24) of a rocket-copter I’m modifying from an existing design for one of the same summer science camps.

Eventually, the fins will unfold and become helicopter blades that will guide it back down to Earth after launch (that should start to happen about 100 feet in the air – in this video, it happens about 2 feet in the air, just before “touch-down”.)

After hours of white knuckle weather forecasts, the skies cleared and we got to see the beautiful sight of the second planet from our Sun crossing 100 million km in front of our local star.

What’s more, because of our location in this migratory bird-watching haven, we ended up with the added treat of seeing thousands of swallows, warblers, and other species flit occasionally in front of our telescope views.

I can’t even begin to remember how many people took in this sight on the sandy shores of Lake Erie, here at the southernmost tip of mainland Canada.

Thanks to Dan Dufour from the Park, Paul Pratt and others from the Windsor Centre of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada for letting me come and play in their sandbox for this once-in-100-year event.

The park is so far south, members of the Windsor Centre have successfully photographed the southern-hemisphere star cluster Omega Centauri from Point Pelee.

It’s also the only place anywhere near Windsor/Detroit where you can see the Milky Way.

After the Sun & Venus had set in this avian & astronomy eco-preserve, we took in fine telescope views of Mars and Saturn, including the ringed planet’s giant moon Titan.

I’ll post more photos here soon from this trip, as well as a preview of the Sky News column I’ll be writing on this incredible stargazing jewel.

(Below: Venus transits the setting sun behind a windmill on the horizon near Lake Erie. Photo by Peter McMahon from Point Pelee National Park, Ontario)