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mistressofmuses) wrote2025-10-18 07:50 pm
mistressofmuses) wrote2025-10-18 07:50 pm
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Monday, September 29: Kiowa County stars
The night after we went to Sand Creek, we stayed in a hotel. It had been a long day, having gotten up early for the long drive, plus the actual visit to the massacre site. I was literally just getting ready to go to bed a bit early, when Alex got an alert on his phone for the possibility of the northern lights to be visible.
Sigh.
Of course, we were very much out in the middle of nowhere, with easy access to some of the darkest skies around. (While Sand Creek itself is not open at night, the ranger we spoke with did talk about it being a protected dark skies site.) So even though I was very sleepy, we headed out to find a deserted road to go hang out on.
We did not see auroras (probably.) We weren't the only ones; while there were a ton of really impressive sightings over in Scandinavia (as usual), and despite the numbers here being really promising... pretty much no one saw them. (While the aurora tracker app that Alex uses measures the K-index, which measures magnetic field disturbances, it's clear there's still other factors in play!)
But... stars!
Our trip up to the northern plains a couple months ago was the first time in a long while that I'd seen the milky way. And then I got to see it again, so soon! There was a bit of cloud cover for a while, but it started to clear up well.
As before, these really only show up well in the dark, I think. And of course the stars were way more vibrant/numerous/impressive in person.
Stars!
I did get this one image of the northernish horizon where there's a red glow, which might be the otherwise pretty much unseen auroras.
I'd think it was a fluke, except Alex got an almost identical picture around the same time. That was about it for the maybe-auroras, though.
There was also a spooky moon again! Though this time it was a spooky moon set rather than moon rise. (Still didn't get a very clear image.)
The spectacular stars were well worth the late-night trip out into the dark, even if the northern lights were a no-show again.
Sigh.
Of course, we were very much out in the middle of nowhere, with easy access to some of the darkest skies around. (While Sand Creek itself is not open at night, the ranger we spoke with did talk about it being a protected dark skies site.) So even though I was very sleepy, we headed out to find a deserted road to go hang out on.
We did not see auroras (probably.) We weren't the only ones; while there were a ton of really impressive sightings over in Scandinavia (as usual), and despite the numbers here being really promising... pretty much no one saw them. (While the aurora tracker app that Alex uses measures the K-index, which measures magnetic field disturbances, it's clear there's still other factors in play!)
But... stars!
Our trip up to the northern plains a couple months ago was the first time in a long while that I'd seen the milky way. And then I got to see it again, so soon! There was a bit of cloud cover for a while, but it started to clear up well.
As before, these really only show up well in the dark, I think. And of course the stars were way more vibrant/numerous/impressive in person.
Stars!
I did get this one image of the northernish horizon where there's a red glow, which might be the otherwise pretty much unseen auroras.
I'd think it was a fluke, except Alex got an almost identical picture around the same time. That was about it for the maybe-auroras, though.
Four more pictures of the stars:
There was also a spooky moon again! Though this time it was a spooky moon set rather than moon rise. (Still didn't get a very clear image.)
The spectacular stars were well worth the late-night trip out into the dark, even if the northern lights were a no-show again.
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The stars at least made it quite worthwhile, even if I wish the lights would make an appearance one of these days!
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But the stars were gorgeous, and it was well worth being out there to see them.
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