La Palma Astro holiday

[carastro]

I wonder if I could pick any brains regarding having an astro holiday at La Palma.  

I seem to have been "volunteered" to organise a trip for my local astro society.   I don't want to tag along with any of the public trips up to the Observatories but rather have a private trip for our group.

Any ideas and advice on what I might be able to organise, and how, best time to go, how to get up the mountain  with a group etc etc. 

Also other activitie we might be able to do in the daytime etc.  Good Travel Agents etc. 

I am grateful for any replies, especially from those who may have done this themselves with a group.

Yours in anticipation.

 

Thanks

Carole 

[Wiu-Wiu]

A lot will depend on how large the group is. 

I always went in quite small groups and we had rental cars, one or two per accomodation. 
 

the area of the observatories is open for anyone during the daytime, it is the only way to visit the vista there. Also, some observatories offer guided tours (like the GTC), but most of them are closed to the public. 
you might be lucky and get a private tour in one, but you’ll have to register a long time in advance and would have to get in touch with the one responsible for that telescope, and get the go from the operator on duty that day. 
 

Be sure to take the driving into account! driving up the roque from las tricias will take you about 30-45 minutes. Depending where your accomodation is, getting to las tricias will take at least equally long. There are no straight roads on LP, and all of them are mostly 1x1. 
 

daytime activities are quite easy: hiking! La Palma is the most green island of the Canaries. But again: you are on a volcano, most routes will break a sweat. Driving from vista to vista is another possibility. A visit to the caldera itself is worth doing, but the park is only open when you have a ticket, so be sure to plan in advance. A visit to the south tip, and the -before last year- “newest” volcanoes, is also worth doing, but the new eruption has cut off that part of the island, and i’m unsure when the new road will be opened. 

if you are considering hotels: most are at the east side of the island, and there is another route up the roque, but I always stay at rental casa’s on the west coast so i can’t help there. 
 

good luck! Definately worth the trip! 

[clarkpm4242]

@carastro Have been several times for astro, though not as a group.

New moon in May is good for early morning Milky Way.

Note the east/north east/north of the isalnd is is cloudy and wet owing to the Trade Winds.   You usually need to get above the inversion layer for observing.

13 minutes ago, Wiu-Wiu said:

Be sure to take the driving into account! driving up the roque from las tricias will take you about 30-45 minutes. Depending where your accomodation is, getting to las tricias will take at least equally long. There are no straight roads on LP, and all of them are mostly 1x1. 

THIS!!!

There are some commercial astro tour organisations on the island that maybe worth looking up.

Hope it works out for you.  I love the island.  Cheers, Paul.

[Ags]

It's sooooooooo dark there! No advice, but I enjoyed a very simple trip - we went to the south-west of the island and mostly stayed around the hotel. Nevertheless, lots of good observing.

Edited July 5, 2022 by Ags

[carastro]

Well this is finally booked, 13 of us going so far, but we decided to book 18 months ahead, so going end August 2024 for several reasons.  Firstly the Observatory has been shut for guided tours ever since the Pandemic, and wasn';t sure when it would be re-opening, plus we want to visit the Lava Caves and they too seem to be not available on several of the Tour Operators werb sites, and I wondered whether it was due to the recent eruption.  Plus we needed 5 single rooms, and there were only 2 left in 2023 several weeks ago when I enquired, so 2024 gave us a better chance and we got them.

Going for one week and planning the following trips once there (fingers crossed they will all be available).

1. Trip up to the observatory and tour inside on Roque de los Muchachos 

2. Lava Caves tour

3. Whales and Dolphin spotting boat trip

4. Tour of CALDERA DE TABURIENTE NATIONAL PARK

5 & 6.  Two trips out at night to do Astronomy, one will be escorted and 1 will be DIY

Hopefully some time to relax too.

I found somewhere we can hire Dobsonians.

Carole 

 

[DaveS]

Not envious at all. Yeah, right 🤣.

The caldera is well worth a tour.

[Pompey Monkey]

You can still drive all the road past the observatories at night, you just cant get in the gates and there are signs (IIRC) asking you to dim your headlights near the top...

I totally recommend, nay, INSIST that you take a drive up there on a moonless night.

I did. Words cannot ever describe it!

[carastro]

Might well do.  
Thanks. 

[Swoop1]

See this green pallor that I have developed?

It is the result of too much Christmas Cheer. Nothing to do with envy.

Honest 🤞

[Pompey Monkey]

You may already have found them, but these people hire out all kinds of stuff.

http://www.athos.org/

 

[GTom]

Anybody regular guest on the island, how do the conditions like on the Northern "cloudy" part look like, e.g. Puntagorda, Garafía? Are there much less clear nights than in the South? Do the light pollution from Los LIanos and of course the mountain horizon destroy the view to the South?

[recceranger]

On 28/06/2022 at 21:39, carastro said:

I wonder if I could pick any brains regarding having an astro holiday at La Palma.  

I seem to have been "volunteered" to organise a trip for my local astro society.   I don't want to tag along with any of the public trips up to the Observatories but rather have a private trip for our group.

Any ideas and advice on what I might be able to organise, and how, best time to go, how to get up the mountain  with a group etc etc. 

Also other activitie we might be able to do in the daytime etc.  Good Travel Agents etc. 

I am grateful for any replies, especially from those who may have done this themselves with a group.

Yours in anticipation.

 

Thanks

Carole 

Hi Carole, both myself and the Mrs have been to La Palma a few times and we often go to the observatory. For the most part is accessible to the public (and private vehicles) up to a certain time before it gets dark. The road that circumvents the observatory is the LP-4 and it’s open to public access 24hrs per day. There are numerous observation points (view points) all along the route so if you want to do some stargazing or imaging it is fine. We usually hire a car and self drive for more flexibility. It takes about 3hrs depending on where on the island you are staying. If you are visiting during the day, you can literally drive right through the observatory all the way to the highest summit of the volcano and get some spectacular views, including of the numerous telescopes.

[Mick J]

8 hours ago, GTom said:

Anybody regular guest on the island, how do the conditions like on the Northern "cloudy" part look like, e.g. Puntagorda, Garafía? Are there much less clear nights than in the South? Do the light pollution from Los LIanos and of course the mountain horizon destroy the view to the South?

The north is much higher and may be above the cloud, I think Puntagorda is popular of course it's a long trip to the beach!!

Many years ago we stayed at Casa Visioneros, near Tijarafe,   as a potluck pick I think we did pretty well.

[GTom]

I see accomodations can be found up to 1'000m asl, not sure though if it's high enough to get over the clouds. I only drove trough the area twice, but it was raining all over the Island then with snow on the Roque😅

[carastro]

Thanks for the new replies.  13 of us have actually already booked in Los Cancajos as we though this would be nice and central and easier to book transport etc.

We are not going until September 2024 as there was doubt whether the observatory would have re-opened after the Pandemic and single rooms were selling out fast.  So we booked 18 months in advance and we needed a number of single rooms.

We want to go to the observatory for a private tour and I think we have found a company to take us as we are a group, but the trouble is the observatory doesn't release it's availability for tours until about 3 months beforehand, and this means we have to book all our other things we want to do around this at the last minute which is a pain as I like to get things organised early to make sure we don;t run out of places especially us being a group.  

We are planning on going on a Whale and Dolphin  trip (opposite side of the island), A tour of the lava caves (middle of island), and a general tour of La Palma, and do some Astronomy.  I have found a company that will take us with scopes provided, but I think with the travelling time we are going to get little actual astronomy done, so we may have to resort to DIY Astronomy.

I think some are planning on hiring vehicles, so we may be able to share.

I also found a couple of places that will loan astro kit.  

Thanks for your continued advice.

Carole 

  

[Live_Steam_Mad]

On 04/07/2022 at 21:23, Ags said:

It's sooooooooo dark there! No advice, but I enjoyed a very simple trip - we went to the south-west of the island and mostly stayed around the hotel. Nevertheless, lots of good observing.

Hi, which Hotel did you stay at? Any recommendations for which room number? lol

Regards,

Al

[carastro]

We have not been yet.  We go at the end of August.  
 

But we have finally found a company that does most of the tours we want to do just 200 yards from our hotel who are very responsive unlike many of the tour operators l have contacted.   Plus not all operators do hotel or close by pick up.  

We have booked the tour of the observatory and the Whales and Dolphins trip.    Unfortunately we aren’t going to be able to go on the lava caves trip because as l feared it is closed since the last eruption due to gases in the caves.  

We are planning some night time Astronomy/imaging and other tours round the island and some of the fitter ones in the group will be doing some hikes including getting to see the recently erupted volcano Cumbre Vieja. 

Carole

 

 

 

Edited March 26 by carastro