The star of the evening – a waxing gibbous moon

What do you get if you cross a bright gibbous moon, award winning haggis and a celebration of Scotland’s bard?  A Lunar Burns Night!

This was our fourth stargazing event up at Abriachan and despite somewhat blustery conditions, ended up being loads of fun with a good turnout across all ages.

Haggis and neep hand warmers

After introductions from the Abriachan crew we kicked off outside with the moon high in the south and making dramatic appearances between fast moving clouds.  After a bit of moon gazing and chat I took everyone back inside the forest classroom for an illustrated talk on the moon – its phases, cycles, observational phenomena and even some discussion on manned moon bases (why the obsession with Mars when we could be building a lovely moon base at much lower cost and risk?).

Presenting my moon talk

After the talk Roni and Suzann called everyone through for Clelland’s dramatic ‘knife wielding’ address to the Haggis, followed by a tasty spread of haggis and neep wraps.  The younger ones then took centre stage as they expertly simulated millions of years of lunar surface evolution – by dropping (never throwing!) metal balls into giant flour trays.  This was followed by 3D moon phases and a competition to see who could guess the real separation between the Earth and Moon.

Addressing the haggis

The evening was topped off up with a haggis drive and Cottar’s tales from Clelland.  I also took a group out for some final moon gazing, and managed to glimpse a few brighter stars between the cloud breaks.

The only disappointment was being unable to set up the video telescope to show folks closeups of the lunar surface.  The sporadic showers and wind made that too challenging on the night, but I don’t think anyone really noticed.

In the thick

Moon craters

We have more astronomy nights planned at Abriachan before the encroachment of our long summer days.  On March 10th we’re hosting a Star Cluster special under dark sky conditions, followed by a Solar Special on April 14th, where we’ll hopefully be projecting the Sun onto a big screen for all to see.  For details please check Abriachan’s or my own Facebook pages.  As ever thanks to the Abriachan team for helping make these events so fun and welcoming.

Clear skies!