The Roden Crater Telescope by jurvetson Portal to a magical overnight at Roden Crater with friends, and the artist James Turrell.
50 years in the making, it’s an art work tunneled through an extinct volcano, aligned with celestial events.
I noticed the crescent moon perfectly centered down the 1000’-long keyhole tunnel. I was excited to share with the group that almost missed it.
The tunnel is purposely built to align with events like this, and it took a year to dig with a tunnel-boring-machine. Craziest of all - it has a 10-ft. diameter lens that can roll out midway down the tunnel, forming the largest refracting telescope on Earth. https://flic.kr/p/2mHj8FJ
a ‘henge’ is arrangement of mega stones in a circle + surrounded by a ditch
inside rings are 'blue stone’ and surround a horse shoe
includes a 'heel stone’ - a marking stone, marks the spot where the sun rose in the summer solstice; stonehenge is an astronomical observatory, and is remarkably accurate to solar calendar
not sure how they got there since their weight is tremendous; the stones are from Wales
Winter solstice occurs on the shortest day and the longest night of the year.
During the winter solstice the the sun aligns across the middle of the monument from the Avenue, past the Heel Stone and through the centre of the three arches of the outer ring.
Manhattanhenge. The 34th Street (from Hudson to East River) is a major crosstown street in the New York City borough of Manhattan, connecting the Lincoln Tunnel and Queens-Midtown Tunnel.
Manhattanhenge. Basically, people in Manhattan are trapped in an island of tall buildings and sometimes can’t even see the sky really. It’s a brilliant moment when they can connect with the rest of the world and with the Earth. It also has the advantage over other skyscraper cities because of a relatively clear view to the horizon down some of its streets. For photographers and people taking an early evening stroll, it is just a beautiful effect of light.
The 34th street is one of the best Manhattanhenge Viewing Spots. Neil deGrasse Tyson (an astrophysicist at the American Museum of Natural History) has singled out 34th Street for rendering “especially striking vistas” during Manhattanhenge, particularly since it features the 102-story Empire State Building. Other notable buildings located directly on 34th Street include the Javits Center and Macy’s Herald Square, among others.
Prehistoric large cup and ring petroglyph at ‘Laxe das Rodas’, Galicia, Spain.
Cup and ring marks or cup marks are a form of prehistoric art found mainly in Atlantic and Mediterranean Europe. They consist of a concave depression, no more than a few centimetres across, pecked into a rock surface and often surrounded by concentric circles also etched into the stone. Sometimes a linear channel called a gutter leads out from the middle. The decoration occurs as a petroglyph on natural boulders and outcrops and also as an element of megalithic art on purposely worked megaliths, and on some stone circles and passage graves.-wikipedia.com
<p>Had possibly the best weekend ever on home soil… leaving the North at 3am on Saturday morning proved worth it when we arrived at Hastings at 8am, a full two hours before most of the other visitors. We got the whole battle site almost to ourselves (besides all of the ‘Saxon’ and ‘Norman’ campers and re-enactors) and got to see both the preparations for the day and all the volunteers going about their medieval early morning business.</p>
<p>Day 1 was topped off by the battle itself (which I wasn’t too sure I’d enjoy, but I’ve been converted!) and I can now honestly say I understand what my college history tutor meant when he made a huge deal of William the Conqueror taking his helmet off in the midst of battle. I think I got goosebumps. </p>
<p>Sunday took us to the beautiful Salisbury Cathedral, where I was so happy to find the Magna Carta exhibition still on (a nice parking attendant told us it’s there permanently from now on), and had a good 'ole peruse of the gift shop, having to physically pull myself away from the bookshelves and only leaving with 3 new books (quite an achievement tbh).<br> And then on to Stonehenge! Still such a mystical place at the actual stones, and very atmospheric.</p>
A book about a subject that’s under constant study is always at risk of being superseded by new discoveries, and, having come out in 2008, this one was before the latest revelation a year or so back that a version of the monument had been set up in Wales first and was physically brought with its builders to the site in Wiltshire and remade…. And that doesn’t matter, where this book is concerned.
This book, you see, isn’t a history of the monument and how it developed. No, this is a book about the history of how it has been viewed and studied since its discovery- by Medieval chroniclers, 17th Century Antiquarians, Victorians, artists, archaeologists, architects, governments, and (of course) wannabe Druids.
It’s a highly readable and fascinating tour through history, taking in why people in different eras thought it was built by Romans; how the different focus of architects, antiquarians, and archaeologists gave them different views; just how the various Druid wannabes got so intertwined with it and their internicine feuding, and sidesteps into intriguing and often amusing bits of the lives and works famous people in the abovementioned fields away from Stonehenge. (To pick a random example, how Frederick Bligh-Bond impressed the Church by discovering lost wings of Glastonbury Cathedral very quickly, then got fired for revealing he had been told where to look by one of the original builders in a séance).
The chapter on more recent decades is also a good brisk eye-opener as to how it became a counterculture icon and the location for protests and violence in the 80s, and where English Heritage really spawned much of that.
And of course there’s a great round up of the physical facts of Stonehenge to start with, and some tips on visiting and further reading to end with.
Engaging, fascinating, good fun, educational, highly readable… Lovely bit of popular history. Very recommended.
The sunrise immediately before summer solstice – when the days gradually start to get shorter – is the moment traditionally marked at Stonehenge, and their live coverage replicates this. This year, summer solstice is at 10:13 BST on Tuesday 21st June.
The live stream will begin at 20:45 BST on Monday 20th June. Sunset is at 21:28 BST. It will be live for approximately 45 minutes before and after. They’ll be streaming the sunrise too. Check their facebook events for the sunrise stream, which will begin at 04:00 BST on Tuesday 21 June.
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