Astronomy

“The first planet we saw was Venus. It was glowing brightly like a diamond in the sky and was soon going to set [...] We were able to see about 40% sunlight reflected by Venus, and it was so bright like a diamond crescent. The next one was Jupiter. Jupiter was visible with the professional scope, a 16 inch Dubsonian telescope and we were able to see the dark spot vaguely. [...] We did watch Jupiter with 5 of its moons visible and revolving around. Until this time, i was hoping that i will see planets life size, right infront of my eyes and BIGGGGG! Unfortunately, i understood our place in this universe, only after watching Jupiter with a powerful scope. It looked like a medium size dot. The moons were smaller size dots. If a Jupiter can hold 1000’s of earth and this looks like a dot, think of our size in this vast universe.”

“I got into stargazing in the first place after moving from the Boston suburbs to the heart of the Adirondack High Peaks about 25 years ago. I was struck by the beauty of the night sky and discovered the Milky Way for the first time – not visible from the city. I was always interested in astronomy – ever since abandoning hope of becoming an astronaut at age 9. But my pent-up excitement – quashed by time spent in an urban area – was unleashed after discovering the Adirondack night sky.”

“My first experience with astronomy was during a school visit to the Adler Planetarium in Chicago in the late 1970's. I think I was in second or third grade. I remember feeling a bit overwhelmed but also awed by the number of star images projected on the planetarium dome. The Zeiss planetarium projector was an amazing piece of technology at the time as there were no computer simulations. I remember thinking that the entire room was spinning but it was just the projector shifting on its axis to move the sky to a different postion!”