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garethmob

By garethmob
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Mountain View

Mountain View

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Ok, Here goes

The possible site at Rudry is Forestry Commission car park located just below the Maenllwyd pub coming from Draethen the coords are

N51 34.361; W003 08.797

It has a South to West aspect but would have some possible car heads lights

My second option is much more interesting, it is the Cwmcarn Scenic Drive, which we know is locked at night, so access to the mountain tops is not an option.

However, as a dark sky site it has a lot to offer, I suspect the light pollution would be very low to negligible. I have spoken with the Visitor Centre today and I am told that the Drive is locked from the 'Pit Wheel' car park

This car park is well up into the valley above the Visitor Centre and Caravan Site and offers parking and a wide expanse of sky above, the best coords I can get from memorymap (haven't been with gps to get an exact fix) are as follows

N 51 38.106; W 003 06.585

If anyone would like to check it out with me please pm me to exchange numbers etc.

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garethmob

garethmob

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iv been up cwmcarn a few times on my way home from work it has a fantastic dark area in the first area (by first carpark which unfortunatly is locked)

the main carpark does have lights on in the night as well as a few for the visitor center

who did you talk to gordon as my uncle is a ranger up on the site when i went there, the lower gate had a sign saying **** after 9 but was still open at 11) it was where the enterance to the caravan/camping park was

id love to check it with you one night gordon, i think i gave you my number before but send me a pm and i can fordward them :)

Edit

i just tried the orordants in google maps and its not picking them up :confused: is it possiable to post the ones from there (to get them right click on the area and click the whats here it will show the coords then

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Mr Flibble

Mr Flibble

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Beacons MC sounds good to me Gaz.

I'm also familiar with the cwmcarn forestry area, lots of good MTB there. That area above the campsite has lots of room for setting up. I'm guessing the skies won't be too dark there being slap bang in the middle of the valleys and surrounded by cwmbran, newbridge, crosskeys, etc. Maybe not a site for viewing the pinwheel in my little scope but good for brighter dso's and lunar and planetary observing.

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garethmob

garethmob

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supprisingly dave at the lowest carpark it is really really dark, i didnt see much LP at all apart from the street which was next to me (wheres a row of houses by the lowest locked carpark)

so i cant see why the carpark by the lake wouldnt be the same, just have a restructed view of the skys due to the mountains either side

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Ganymede12

Ganymede12

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I've been exploring on Google maps and I may have found a good location but I haven't been there... at all! I've only seen it from Google maps.

Also I can't find a name for the place but Iv'e got Google maps coordinates!

Here they are!

52.117034,-3.765231

So If anyone has ever been there or is near enough to investigate, please report back!

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garethmob

garethmob

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ahhh its near llandovery that should be a very dark place in theory as its getting close to the heart of wales (some of the darkest sky) its actually further away than where the meet steve mentioned on the forum, so i can only assume it would be impressive

the only problem would be that its 2 hours away from a lot of members so perhaps not a regular site, but one of the one off ones a few times of the year :) hopefully one of our members might be ablle to check it out for us to see its suituabilty as i wouldnt be able to get there my self

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Mr Flibble

Mr Flibble

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Funnily enough I've also been biking around that area as well (groan!!!!) 52.117034,-3.765231. Very dark skies there. And also toilet facilities - you can see the toilet block a little further on at the other car park right next to the reservoir if you use google map and click on satelite view. And as a coincidence there is a campsite in rhandirmwyn which is about half the way back towards llandovery which is one of the ones I suggested as a possibility for our star party. The distance is much further tho.

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Mountain View

Mountain View

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The Pit Wheel is quite way beyond the Visitor Centre, it would have good parking and a decent set up area

Field of view is obviously going to be restricted by the surrounding mountains, but it should a very dark site and if so should give plenty to observe

We can't expect to have everything in one place but this holds the hope of giving as dark a site as you might reasonably want

Life is after all a compromise

All the best

Gordon

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garethmob

garethmob

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weather permitting me and gordon are going to look at cwmcarn this week, even if its not really clear it should give a deffination of how dark its actually getting.

hopefully it will be as promised as cwmcarn is placed fairly closed to about 60% of the members of the group, and expessially as cardiff astro society use the upper car parks (which unfortunatly get locked after 10pm any other time) it means it is a good site to use

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garethmob

garethmob

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the area does look nice but it is a little close to this side of the becons

one area i was thinking very close to your link actually, is Llangorse lake as it is very low down in the valley (and not far from crickhowel and has really nice views of the north east and west (only been there in the day..... day out on boating lake and feeding the swans)

51.931671,-3.267746

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bcfcciderhead

bcfcciderhead

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I often have a drive to Cwmcarn with the kids, could prove to be a good spot, could take a ride out this weekend to have a look.

Also take a look at Machen common, my first "dark" site when i got my first scope (2ooP dob), the site has plenty of room but as its a bit high up you are looking down on Risca/crosskeys, but i did have some good views of many DSO, the site its self is very dark......just a thought

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garethmob

garethmob

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me and gordon (mountain view) went up cwmcarn last night to test it out better in darkness

luckly it was very clear skys with a few drifting clouds around 8 oclock we drove up to the pit wheel "carpark" and it was a really open sky from east to west. north - south obviously restricted by the hills

as darkness came we got our scopes out and managed to see venus really really clearly (megrez and gordons scope) but didnt want to chance it as it being there too late as there was a sign saying gate closed after 10pm so we moved to the visitor carpark, and there is a fair few lights there but they are dimmed so it wasnt that bad.

we took a walk over to the lowest carpark (the gate IS closed at 9pm but there is various access points to walk through, and again it was very good skys. i would argubly say it was pretty dark and not as much LP as i expected (them hills do us good)

we walked back to the cars and as we were the ISS clearly went over the top of us followed by another satilight so it was worth the trip even for that as in bins you could still make out a slight shape to it

w then took a wander to the closest lake (the 10pm gate i mentioned above wasnt locked, it was about quater past 10 by now) and we walked past the campsit to the lake, again relly nice sky but LP was rather creaping around us from the other side of the hills (the closest towns / cwmbran/pontypool in the distances) but we maneged to make out the double cluster and the beehive, mars obviously venus all with our bins

at around 11pm it was starting to get cloudy so we decided to call it anight

but review time

the site shows alot of promise, and as it has been used by cardiff astro soitety and they were asked back very quickly it means cwmcarn are interested in promoting astronomy so we might be able to use it as an advntage

but that gate could cause a few problems. it was electronic though with a number pad, which i thought we might be able to get a code for the night if we wanted to get up to the pitwheel (as the next 2 gates were deffinatly locked)

the lowest carpark was very nice, but again no drive in access would have to park and walk through a gate a few yards away

so overall i think we should consider this site, and i'll see what i can do about access

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stevetynant

stevetynant

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Sounds promising Gaz- thanks,nice report

I think access by car is a prerequisite personally - theres some pretty big scopes to move about from some of the members even for a short distance so if we could get access on pre-aranged nights that would be a definite plus

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