Stargazing at Moʻokini

Tonight there was a very special event at the Moʻokini Heiau. ʻOhana Stargazing coordinated with caretakers of the heiau to have star gazing with astronomers from the university as well as observatories on Mauna Kea. The evening started with protocol to enter the sacred space, pule & oli, & presentation of hoʻokupu. Later there was moʻolelo about celestial events as well as kalua pig & cabbage dinner prepared by the Kawaihae Canoe Club as a fundraiser.

On my way down Old Coast Guard Road.

Maui as seen from dirt road out to heiau.

Cars in distance parked at heiau.

After dark, the telescopes were aimed at various things in the sky. I got to see the Ring Nebula, Antares, the Moon, a big bunch of stars called M31, & Saturn & its rings! The astronomers were from various places & included the deputy director of the Gemini Observatory! (Whom I asked if he was one of the astronomy graduate researchers. 😬 He was very nice & told me who he was. It was dark, couldn't really see much except that they had reflective vests on.) I learned that the amazing color depictions on the Internet that you see when you click on the links above are not what you see in real life. Those images are depictions based on the wavelength of the light emitted not what can actually be seen by a human looking through a telescope. Some of which were extremely sophisticated! 

Telescopes set up outside heiau while people enter to present hoʻokupu.

Forty minutes before sunset.

Eight minutes before sunset.

Twenty-five minutes after sunset.

Checking out the Moon forty-three minutes after sunset.

It was a pretty good sunrise this morning. Patchy clouds but nothing that might block out all the stars. It stayed that way throughout the day & in to the evening.

When I went in to the cat room, I found the Eufy robot vacuum stuck on one of the Muddy Mats. The side sweeper brush was so tangled in the mat I had to disconnect it from the rest of the machine to get it unstuck. But that was OK, I needed to replace it anyway.

I looked out the window & saw Hoʻokoa sunning himself on the rock wall. As I watched he quickly got up & pounced on something further along the wall. Unfortunately it was partially blocked by the tall grass so I don't know what it was. My guess is that it was a gecko, probably also sunning itself on the rock wall.

The next episode of the eruption at Kīlauea is still predicted to be sometime between the 28th & the 1st.

Hauʻoli lā Hānau e Dwight, Angela, & The Roommate Who Likes to Wash Dishes!