New Name:Elevated Astronomy Tours!

We have a new name! Mile High Astronomy Tours is now Elevated Astronomy Tours!

The real news is I got approval from the city of Boulder OSMP to conduct tours on their land!

There's a few reasons for the name change. Elevated Astronomy is more unique. I wanted to honour Boulder (which is more than a mile high 5328ft = 1.009mi... not that it matters) as they are allowing me to do tours with little restriction. Denver mandates all events end prior to sun set (not gonna work for astronomy) due to curfew.

Also I don't like when things are called 'mile high' outside of Denver. Here's the story I wanted to get a Harley shirt for my mate, from my home town, to add to his collection so, I stop in to "mile high harley davidson" to find out I'm in Aurora CO and not one of their shirts says Denver CO just Aurora.

The Denver Museum of Nature and Science changed their name twice now giving them three names The Colorado Museum of Natural History, The Denver Museum of Natural History, and The Denver Museum of Nature and Science. The first time was because they were getting more support from Denver. However, they never really gave up any of their former names you can still say The Colorado or Denver Museum of Natural History as a valid name, they just no longer publicise those names. I like this and am going to approach my name change the same way.

Mile High Astronomy Tours is still a valid name, feel free to call my business whatever you like best!

The Pleiades a car commercial in the sky.

The Pleiades is an open star cluster of about about 380 light years away and 13 light years across. Often called the seven sisters it actually contains thousands of stars, this becomes clear when looking at it with a telescope or binoculars.

Currently you can see the Pleiades just after sun set. If you look west just after the last refracted light of the sun set has faded from our atmosphere, the first thing you will notice is the "evening star" a really bright point just above where the sun set. The "evening star" is actually the planet Venus it cycles between being the evening star and the morning star as is traverses around the sun. If you keep looking down from Venus you will see a faint group of stars (getting away from any city lights will help in seeing it).... You can also see the Pleiades during the day by looking at the Subaru logos on cars in the streets!

Most people can see at least 6 stars in this group (just as in the logo), some can see 7. In a telescope, or binoculars you can see thousands. In really large telescopes or long exposures you can see the reflection nebula the stars are in (the blue cloud the stars are in in the top picture). These stars are young they were all born in the same nebula and are now starting to leave their birthplace and go their separate ways across our galaxy.  @subaru doesn't sponsor me however they should given how often I mention this fact this time of year.

I captured this a few weeks ago from my balcony. Notice Venus in the bottom right, and the Pleiades in the middle right (they are now swapped as we've moved a bit around the sun since this was taken). You can also see on this night the moon was in another larger open cluster called the Hyades ( the Hyades is also known as the head of Taurus the bull).

By Jove!

Come see Jupiter at its closest for free this weekend at our trial tour launch! Booking at https://www.astrotours.org/book-online is required.

You will be able to see this alignment with your own eyes tomorrow at sunset (8:02PM). After you watch the sunset, turn your back to where you just saw the sunset. You should see a bright 'star' rising on the eastern horizon, opposite of where the sun set. This 'star' is actually the planet Jupiter reflecting the light of the sun back at you.

Looking at Jupiter with a good pair of binoculars allows you to see the 4 Galilean moons as bright dots lined up with Jupiter.

As Greg Quicke's Astro Tours says "opposition just means we're passing on the inside lane" so tomorrow we will be passing Jupiter on the inside lane!