Perseid redux

It was only a week after taking it to the shop that I got my computer back, fixed and with new memory. Only last night did I have a chance to look at my photos from the Perseid meteor shower and to my surprise I discovered a lone meteor in one of my photos - I was expecting nothing. It can only really be seen on the larger size, in the top left, rising almost vertically. This shot was from a 73 second exposure and so the star detail isn't bad, and Andromeda can be seen quite clearly about 5 o'clock from the centre (click on the photo to see the notes).

The best view, photographically speaking was certainly the rising moon which came up a deeper red than I've ever seen it before, an incredible sight, looking down at the horizon at a lower altitude than we were:

Anyway, four friends are about to turn up from England one of them acting as my tea mule, and we shall be spending the weekend out exploring while the good weather here continues.

The Perseids at Pico Sacro

Last night saw perfect conditions for watching the Perseid meteor shower. A car-load of us headed up to Pico Sacro, around 15 km outside of Santiago where the Milky Way shines brightly above the light pollution from the towns and villages below the peak. We set ourselves up as Cassiopeia was rising and before the moon had reached the horizon and watched as perhaps 40 or so meteors streaked across the sky through the time we lay back, watching the display. A few absolute corkers made up for the occasional dry spell, but during those periods the view was still stunning, with Jupiter outshining everything around it.

Around half past midnight a strange red apparition appeared on the horizon as the waning moon rose over the hills in the distance. I'm not sure I've ever seen such a blood red moon of which I have a photo which I'll post up soon. Photos may take a little while to process as, on arriving back home I discovered my computer had silently passed away in the night. It's now in the shop were the death squeals are being analysed to see what is salvagable. At 18 months old this is a surprising turn of events, but hopefully given my backups, nothing should be lost.

The many degrees of Wuhan

This evening I'll head off on a ten hour train ride to Wuhan, capital of Hubei province, famous for being one of the four furnaces of China and also for having some excellent spicy duck's neck (superb as a snack with a cold beer). There is more to Wuhan than this, though last time I spent more time on the plane and road getting to and from the university than actually seeing it or any of the researchers.

This time I'm staying for a three day workshop on quark matter and again presenting on QCD from the AdS/CFT correspondence. I hope to see a bit of the city as well as discussing with some excellent researchers, both from China and the US, who will be at the workshop.

I spent most of yesterday stuffing myself in the all you can drink for 18 kuai (a little more than a pound) cafe near my flat while working on a current project and getting my talk for tomorrow polished off. I do find the buzz of a cafe inherently conducive to good work and almost without fail have more breakthroughs in these relatively noisy places than in the rather sterile environment of my office.

After spending all day in the cafe, a few of us headed over to Sanlitun in the East of the city, went to Kokomo (up on the roof of one of the taller buildings in the area), ordered a beer, sat back and watched for the Perseids. A strange sight for the others in the bar perhaps but we wanted to take advantage of the fact that Beijing is pretty cloudless at the moment (I speak a little too soon, I fear) due to last week's artificially induced storms and reduced traffic. We saw a few throughout the night, coming from the East, though you really need to be up in the early hours of the morning to catch the height of the showers, as the part of the Earth you are on is travelling towards the patch of dust and rock.

(The Bad Astronomer on watching the meteor shower)

Anyway, for now I'll leave some photos from last weekend, when I took a good friend for a birthday meal at Haiku, one of Beijing's top Japanese restaurants. Well worth a trip for the atmosphere and service. The food is good but sadly by my sushi standards which have been permanently affected by my stay in Tokyo, the food was excellent but not mind blowing.

The first photo is of the Beijing national gallery, currently housing an exhibition of works from the Prado. An excellent collection from Titian to Goya, with lots in between. Well worth a trip (though check online if it's still on). We went there in the afternoon before going for dinner.

I attempted to get a good view of the new, amazing structure which will be the CCTV headquarters. These two, leaning towers which will meet in a tangle at the top should be great for photographing, but from our position we could only get a hint of them.

and some photos from Haiku:




OK, got to go finish getting ready for the train ride ahead.