Friday 21st March, 2025

Both Friday and Saturday were forecast to be about 35C in Chittering. We therefore decided to go there later in the day on Friday and to return Saturday morning. The event was a more modest ‘dark sky’ meetup, but we were interested to try it out as these are held regularly in this location and it’s pretty close to Perth, just an hour’s drive out on Tonkin Highway and then the Great Northern Highway.

We bought some food at the local IGA on the way. Unfortunately with our local IGA some of the food is not as fresh as we would like. Perhaps due to there being so much competition from other supermarkets in our area. We missed buying yogurt, even though it was on my list, so we drove into Bindoon and went to the IGA there before going to Chittering Acres. It’s a lovely IGA and we wished we had done all of our shopping there. We wanted small quantities of food to fit in our fridge and only needed food for an evening meal and breakfast.

We drove through the gates up to the camping spot with a viewing area. As it was our first time we were glad of the photos that had been posted as a guide because there were several options after entering the gate.

There were only two other cars there when we arrived and we had to guess where to park. We wanted to be away from the viewing area so we could use at least some of our interior lights without causing problems.

Stephen decided not to take his telescope as there was an invitation to use other people’s telescopes. We took the SeeStar and the astronomy binoculars. In the end we only used the SeeStar.

The dark sky area for camping and viewing is in a beautiful setting. There were kangaroos grazing towards sunset and in the morning. 

Eventually there were about 10 cars in a row, with telescopes set up in a line behind each vehicle. Stephen had a good time down with the mostly men and their telescopes and I sat near the Sherwood using the SeeStar.

It was quite a mild night, which we appreciated as we didn’t get chilled being outside in the dark. Although we could hear traffic on the highway there were no lights causing distraction as there had been at Neergabby.

I was tired and went to bed quite early. All of the other stargazers left, many at the same time. They must have agreed on a finish time so that the lights would not cause a problem.

In the morning we confirmed that we were the only stargazers left in our camping area, though there were other people and vehicles around. Chittering Acres is listed on Wikicamps for general camping and you have to book and pay, but as members of AGWA we were able to stay one night for free.

We had parked in shade in the afternoon and had shade from different trees in the morning, but left by about 9.30 a.m. anyway as we could feel that the temperature was going to affect us once we lost our shade.

We went into Bindoon to the bakery. We enjoyed hot/cold drinks, but weren’t tempted by the cakes, possibly because we had a trifle from IGA the night before. It was noisy, as usual, but I saw one little girl helping her mother who walked with a medical walking stick, it was very touching to see. The woman’s husband and son raced off, but this girl of about 8 years old was very helpful. I mentioned it to the mother and she said her daughter is very sweet.

We would have been able to get home in about an hour except that I needed a public toilet. We diverted to Bullsbrook, then back on the highway to home.

We really enjoyed being in the bushland setting. I think it would be even more lovely to be there in slightly cooler weather. 

There is another dark sky event with a different club this coming weekend, and we are in two minds (well, perhaps four minds) about going as we are having an autumn heatwave this week. We are intrigued about the location. The club leases a plot of land near Tammin and they also do some catering for evening meals at their dark sky events. We want to go, but can we cope with the heat?

Friday 28th February to Sunday 2nd March, 2025

On Friday we set off at about 2.00 p.m. and after a fairly slow journey up the freeway arrived at about 4.00 p.m. The Star Party was held at the Neergabby Campground, which incorporates a large area for camping, a small viewing area, a couple of buildings and a large rotunda and permanent toilets/showers.  The also had some portaloos to help with the large numbers of people in tents.

We were advised to go into the camper van camping area. In the end there were only two of us. We didn’t mention that we had our telescope onboard as we wanted to see how things panned out before committing to getting it out.

We had time to set up before walking over to the sausage sizzle for tea. The cooking was well over by the time we arrived, but there were sausages kept warm and someone to serve us. We had three sausages, two in rolls that we ate sitting nearby and one in a slice of bread that we took back to the Sherwood to have with some lettuce. We had been expecting some socialising to be happening, but apart from saying hello to a few people there was not much interaction.

There was a talk in the viewing area (where telescopes were set up) starting at about 7.30 p.m. We took our camp chairs and were in such good time that we were the first to arrive. Then others drifted in and eventually the talk began. We were given information about what we would be seeing after dark and as it became darker the speaker used a laser pointer to point to constellations and stars, very helpful.

After dark we could only use red lights and our little headlamps came in handy. One of the things we discovered over the two nights was that sometimes we would inadvertently switch on the white light. Anyone who did so was berated loudly by the organisers (Mike and Rick).

Stephen had one of his walking poles with him and was stumbling around quite a bit. I helped for awhile, but found standing tiring so had to sit. Curiously, on the second night Stephen was much more able to keep his balance in the dim light. We had to queue to view through the telescopes. Although they were more powerful than our 6” Celestron we didn’t really feel that we had a much better view. Interesting.

Eventually we both wanted to retire and went back to the Sherwood. The other campers had a bright light shining outside, evidently they didn’t get the memo about keeping things dim. They didn’t come back for the second night, so perhaps not that keen.

After a good night’s sleep we woke to a cool and sunny morning. We had a leisurely breakfast, then headed down the the Gravity Centre. We had wrist bands that gave us half price entry and planned to spend the day there attending talks. We were told that the cafe wasn’t open and had made a cheese roll to take with us. There was a bit of a cafe, we were able to get coffees and ice creams, which helped to keep us going through four lectures.

It might seem mad, but we wanted to take full advantage of being there and find out anything we could that would help us with our stargazing.

The first talk was with Rick Tonello, the Chief Astronomer at the Gravity Centre, about the sun, followed by a viewing through a telescope. We didn’t get the viewing as we wanted to go to the next talk on the different ways you could die in the universe. We then had a break, followed by a talk by Rick on Astrophotography, which he calls Astronomy Photographica. I found it very interesting as this is something I would like to do. I’ve experimented with the iPhone and would like to be able to do it with my camera.

The last talk was about using telescopes and this was very interesting for us. The talk was lead by Mike and he offered to help people with their telescopes in the evening when we went back to the campground.

When we arrived at the campground we said that we wanted to set up our telescope and were able to camp close to the viewing area. This had a downside as we had to be very careful with our lights later in the evening when we were getting ready for bed. Some of the folk stayed up until the early hours of the morning using their telescopes.

We decided to skip the sausages and heated up some leftovers we had brought from home. Stephen was able to set up our telescope before dark and Mike came along and helped.

The first event was a talk by Dr Noel Nannup, Aboriginal Elder, storyteller and cultural guide. As we were busy with our telescopes (I set up the SeeStar S50 as well as our main telescope) we didn’t have enough time to hear the full talk, but I wandered over and confirmed that he is a great story teller, so next time I will make sure I have time to listen to him. He works with the Gravity Centre to bring the Aboriginal perspectives on the stars and constellations.

By the time the evening was over, for us, at about 10.30 p.m. Stephen was feeling much more confident about using the telescope. Mike had been very helpful and confirmed that we only need to do a two star alignment, as our telescope only goes to two, although three is recommended.

I managed to get a faint image on the SeeStar, not what I wanted. Mike had given me a helpful hint about how to find out our GPS location as I’ve found the SeeStar doesn’t automatically find it. You use Google Maps, of course.

We packed away all the electronics, but left the tripod out as it’s sturdy enough to cope with the dew. We had to store things in our living space as we couldn’t open the car doors without causing a white light event. As it was, I was taking photos with the iPhone and it sometimes switched on a white light. It will be much better to work with the camera, which actually doesn’t have a flash to be inadvertently triggered.

Again, we had a good night’s sleep and woke up to sunshine. It was promising to be a warmer day than Saturday and we weren’t tempted to linger past about 10.00 a.m. 

We took a little walk to the nearby river, really a small brook that must be spring fed as the water was not only flowing, but was very clear. Amazing to have flowing water at the end of summer. It’s called the Nullagine River and runs through to the Moore River.

We also checked out the toilets behind the main building and found them old, but OK. Nicer than the portables anyway.

It’s always a bit of a job to pack up everything and I like to have a bit of a rest before driving, so we went to a nearby cafe in Woodridge for hot drinks. On the way home I decided to stick with Wanneroo Road rather than taking the freeway and it was a much better drive, slower, and in the northern part, also more scenic.