The Oregon Outback International Dark Sky Sanctuary
hereisoregon.com
hereisoregon.com
I've been to quite a few remote dark sky sites, but this place was something else.
Later that night a storm rolled in and I had to get off the Playa due to the strong winds and blowing sand and dust.
I ended up sleeping in my Jeep next to a power substation since I only had a half tank of gas and that wasn't enough to get me to the nearest open gas station. At this time in Oregon even the rural gas stations were full service only so I had to wait until morning when the store at Fields Station opened up and I could gas up and get back home.
It was a memorable trip.
I absolutely agree it's amazing.
Oregon is such a beautiful state.
A 2.5 million-acre swath of southern Oregon has been named the largest Dark Sky Sanctuary in the world.
The Radio Quiet Zone, centred on Inyarrimanha Ilgari Bundara, the CSIRO Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory, comprises:
* An Outer Zone from a 70km to 150km radius; and
* Coordination zones from 70km up to 260km radius (depending on frequency).
https://www.atnf.csiro.au/projects/askap/ARQZWA.html
Given the absence of townsites and infrastructure (aside from unmanned radio telescopes and cosmic microwave detectors, etc) it is pretty "dark" at night (aside from the overwhelming glare of the milky way in the southern hemisphere) - it's just not an "official Dark Sky Sanctuary".
For those interested: a global Light Pollution Map
Then a few months later I drove the Canning Stock Route, the world's most remote road [3]. In 1,050 miles over 10 days I never saw another vehicle or person on the track. I went into one aboriginal community to buy gas, it was the only "lightbulb" I saw in ten days. I have not really looked it up, but I suspect I was about as far from a lightbulb as you can drive to on planet earth, and the stars every night were utterly incredible. I stayed up way later than I should have night after night trying to take it all in. The Canning is in Western Australia, a state that is approaching twice as big as Alaska.[4]
Dark skies are awesome!
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GmJKXDdrvcI
[2] https://www.instagram.com/p/CersLuLBfCz/
A few suggestions in that part of Oregon:
* Close to Bend, you can visit the Pine Mountain Observatory, which is open to the public in the summer. https://pmo.uoregon.edu/visiting/ - at 6000 feet, and far from anything, the views of the night sky even without telescopes are amazing. And the staff there point the scopes at interesting sights and explain what they are.
* Further out, Steens mountain and that area is incredible. It's one of the most remote parts of the US outside of Alaska.
* The Christmas Valley area has a lot of interesting things like Fort Rock, Crack-in-the-Ground, Hole-in-the-Ground and the sand dunes.
If I’m going be less selfish, I should probably mention that my next favorite stargazing spots are Star Valley, WY (yes, named for the celestial views); the high mountain plateaus (8,000-10,000ft+ altitude) between Bozeman, MT and Red Lodge, MT; and Central Idaho (Sawtooth or White Cloud Ranges).
I haven’t made it to Steens yet, thanks for the prompt ;)
Happy Stargazing!
* High Desert
* Pine Mountain
* Cascade
>* The Christmas Valley area has a lot of interesting things like Fort Rock, Crack-in-the-Ground, Hole-in-the-Ground and the sand dunes.
Great list, I'd also add Summer Lake Hot Springs, Freemont Point Lookout, The Lost Forest, Glass Butte, the sunstone mines near Plush, pretty much all of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, Crane Hot Springs, might as well throw in Painted Hills, there's so much!
I have been extremely pessimistic about the dark sky movement making progress at all given how desperately fearful of any darkness the areas around me seem to be (daylight-bright streetlights, storefront signs to rival Vegas, etc.)
Truly dark skies are magical. I'm so glad they'll be around at least a bit longer.
Only affiliation is I been going for a couple of decades.
The sanctuary is a term which was introduced in the last decade, and with loose subjective definition
> Sanctuaries are the most remote (and often darkest) places in the world whose conservation state is most fragile.
> In 2015, the IDA introduced the term "Dark Sky Sanctuary" and designated the Elqui Valley of northern Chile as the world's first International Dark Sky Sanctuary.
There are legally protected zones like mentioned in [1], but seem to cover smaller patches of area. But how is a sanctuary protected by legal enforceable measures isn't described in the same spirit. Probably this is something area experts & conservationists know better.
The verbiage is at best a tad confusing IMHO. While places like Central Australia or South NZ is remote, Oregon outback is much more accessible. I'd wager Star valley is on similar league of being pristine and yet more remote being in WY.
My girlfriend and I had a similar experience at Volcanoes National Park in Hawaii. We went to see some of the active lava flows a couple years ago. The park is open 24/7, so one night around midnight we took a walk on the side of the caldera where all you can see is the lava glow (and had no people) and the view of the sky was absolutely spectacular. The Milky Way just smacks you in the face. There’s a reason why they built telescopes on Mouna Kea!
I live in an area where we can just barely still see the milky way, but light pollution is encroaching steadily.
The main problem is all the empty office buildings decided they need to leave their lights on 24/7. (Check out a light pollution map of Silicon Valley to see which megacorps are the worst offenders).
LED lights are probably a bigger problem though. They’re free to run, so people leave them on all night. Global light pollution has been growing exponentially in the last decade (faster than the population).
Yeah white lights can't be filtered out whereas sodium vapor lamps' narrow emission spectrum can be easily blocked by special filters.
Also, many LEDs have reflectors on top that prevent them from shooting light into the sky. These aren't required by building codes from what I've seen. Similarly, I don't think buildings are designed with this in mind.
Office buildings with massive glass atriums / skylights tend to be particularly bad offenders, since indoor lighting is often designed to bounce light off the ceiling.
I'd love to watch a satire where eco-terrorists in cat suits attempt to do what you're suggesting though.
Don't be surprised when in a few years we'll have ads plastered across the sky (day and night) via drones or novel projection technologies; it's not like you're gonna see the stars beyond the Starlink junk field anyway...
Taking people who’ve spent their entire lives in populated areas into the backcountry and spending a couple of hours with them just staring up at the sky as their eyes adjust and the shapes and colors of the Milky Way appear is kind of a mystical experience.
Naturally, I do wish that they were even darker and less obtrusive but oh well.
[1] https://www.businessinsider.com/spacex-starlink-internet-sat...
> The designation was given by DarkSky International, an organization dedicated to protecting the nighttime environment and preserving dark skies through environmentally responsible outdoor lighting. The project is the work of the Oregon Dark Sky Network, an ad-hoc group of state, local and federal officials, private individuals, business owners and tourism agencies.
If only a nonprofit is claiming it, unless they purchased the land, this isn't legally enforceable without a heavy-handed backing of state government. Such protections have to get cemented by some legislation as the next step.
We stayed in a place with an A frame roof that opens into a V shape so you can lie in bed and watch the stars, which was pretty great[2].
I wouldn’t give up artificial light for a second, but everyone should experience the night sky as our ancestors saw it
As an Oregonian I'm both proud and surprised. Nice work to all involved.
Can you elaborate on why the elevation matters? I mean, a few thousand feet isn't going to make up the distance between the earth and the star providing the light. ;)
Dry near zero humidity desert locations also have spectactular night views.
I didn’t bring a tent so I slept under the night sky.
I remember waking up and thinking “aha, that’s why it’s called the Milky Way”.