Sunday, May 20, 2012

May 20 – To Valleyview, Alberta


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The road today was all 4 lane divided highway. Very boring. As it goes around most of the town we don’t get to see them at all.

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We are currently parked at the visitor’s center just outside Valleyview. The ladies inside gave us a lot of tips on our upcoming travel and said it was OK to park here overnight.

There really was a valley view far off into the distance.

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The highlight today for me was the partial solar eclipse. We are not in the direct path of the shadow but we did see the moon take a large bite out of the sun.

I set up my scope with the camera and a solar filter on the end, which blocks out most of the light making it safe to look through the eyepiece or the camera viewfinder.

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The progression

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The small specks that you can see on the sun in the pictures are sunspots.

In Toronto, I am told my fellow amateur astronomers only saw the beginning before the sun set. Here the sun was about 30 degrees up when it started at around 6 pm local time and about 15 degrees up when it ended at around 8. The sky was mostly clear. There were a few clouds but I couldn’t really ask for much more.

Tomorrow we are off to Dawson Creek, BC and the start of the Alaska Highway.

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