Moz the Monster makes it to the Roque de los Muchachos..

[James]

No seriously, this isn't an advert for John Lewis etc...

I took Kate and Tom up to the Roque de los Muchachos one night (sadly not for the Perseids).  Getting pictures with Tom in that didn't involve Moz or wierd finger gestures (that for all I know are pretty rude) is tricky. Getting both him and Kate to stand still for 20 seconds is also very hard. I must be more practiced... I thought I was getting a picture of me, Tom & Kate, some of the scopes and the Milky Way but no... Tom was holding Moz.

The picture was taken shortly after sunset and is illuminated by a crescent moon off to the right. I used a very wide angle lens hence why at least one of the observatories looks like it's going to fall over  

Jupiter is the distorted object to the right (maybe f/1.8 wasn't the best option!), Saturn is lost in the Milky Way, Mars is off to the left.

The skies were good but not perfect that night - there was some lingering Calima (desert dust) at lower altitudes. But, as an indicator of how good the skies were despite this we were all able to see Venus, Jupiter and Mars as the sun was setting. Saturn was visible a few minutes later about 15 minutes after sunset. It was surreal seeing all those planets whilst still in daylight (albeit subdued..).

 

 

[DirkSteele]

That is a great photo.

[MarsG76]

What a great trip....

[RichM63]

Lovely group picture.

I don't need to use my very wide lenses to make things look as though they are ready to fall over, I can do this with a 600mm!