The Blog

My Eyes Hurt (and 100 posts too)...

A short summary of the transit of Venus (I'll write up something that makes more sense once I've had a cup of tea, some sleep and the chance to get my photos up):

I missed first contact (when venus first touched the edge of the sun), as one of the other astronomers there wanted to look through my telescope and I was feeling generous. Plus I didn't have a watch.

Anyway, it's still going on in other parts of the world, but it's been dark here for a couple of hours now. I'm very tired, but I took a fair few photos when I got a camera, and I'll post the link to them when James gets home and has a moment in which to upload them all from his camera (he's pretty busy at the moment, so there's no pressure).

All in all, a fantastic view, and I'm so glad I got to play with a telescope all day to see such a history event. I kinda wish I'd had a watch (mine had its battery die the other day), so that I could have done the timing of the difference between first and second contact (when venus is first fully on the disk of the sun) and done the calculation of the distance between the earth and the sun (with the help of some other astronomer on the other side of the planet) so I could compare my value with Captain Cook's.

Anyway, there'll be a more lucid post with explanations later, I'm sure.

Labels: this was before tags