Informations
SPACE is a story of two persons who met a few years ago in La Serena, Chile. Alejandra is a technician in tourism and Alain is an engineer in astronomy. Alain visited San Pedro in 2000 and was amazed by the beauty of the sky and the Earth there. Ale came later, and in 2003 we got married and bought a house in Solor, south of San Pedro. The first telescopes were installed on this land, and more came. We now have the largest public observatory in Chile. One of the goal of the project is to conduct private research on Near Earth Asteroids and Comets. The other is to show the sky to the many people who come to San Pedro, without having access to a telescope. Visual observation of the sky is a very spectacular activity. It goes from the peaceful contemplation of the naked eye sky, to the telescopic observations of objects which are really spectacular like the craters of the Moon, the rings of Saturn, the view of many clusters of stars, the appearence of faint galaxies, to the philosophical contemplation of our universe. Explained by a guide with a powerful telescope, the sky suddenly turns from a 2 dimensional image to a 3 dimensional one. The Solar System, the magnificent Milky Way as seen from here, the farthest galaxies... Our tours last usually two hours and a half. But you will remember the experience much longer. Since many years, we are hosting telescopes used over the internet for research purposes, and offer the possibility to take images through automated telescopes.
Sky Maps
This page should permit you to print sky maps for the latitude of San Pedro de Atacama, or any other place on Earth with an approximate latitude of -23° south.
Local Weather
You have below information from our weather station, then from the ESO weather page showing the satellite map, then the image of our all sky camera, then the readings from our Sky Quality Meter.
Tips to travel to northern Chile
San Pedro de Atacama is an oasis in the Atacama desert. Seen from far, it can be located near the triple custom between Bolivia, Argentina and Chile, in Chile. It has been inhabited since thousands of years by the atacamenian indians (Likan Antay people). It is bordered by the Andes Cordillera to the East, and the salar (salt lake) de Atacama in the south.
The astronomical Chile for the amateur astronomer
As far as weather is concerned, it is important to know that we have two winters here. The "regular" austral winter, from July to August, then the "altiplanic" winter, in January and February, the second one being normally worse than the first one.
Gene Shoemaker Observatory
The Gene Shoemaker Observatory is the research part of the observatory. It has been named after the famed planetologist Eugene Shoemaker, but also personal friend of Alain Maury. The goal of this observatory is to study Near Earth Objects and comets.