Regular Schotel-bulletin-readers will know how, on my travels, I try to visit telescopes. Last year, for instance I visited the Ventspils (Letland/Latvia) telescope and recently, with the Isaac Newton Group, the MAGIC telescopes at La Palma. In the timespan of Sunday 9 through Friday 14 May 2010, I was in Lithuania. A firstclass opportunity indeed of visiting the optical Molétai telescope. This observatory is part of the faculty “Theoretical Physics and Astronomy” of Vilnius University. The place of Morétai is situated at about 70 km north of the capital of Vilnius. The observatory on Kaldiniai hill near Kulionys is a number of kms away from Morétai. It can be reached from the direct road A14 from Vilnius to Utena. In 1969 the observatory was moved from Vilnius to its present location. In the course of time, in its former location near Vilnius-park, where it had been built in 1921, it had to cope with lightpolution more and more. The original observations in Vilnius were started as early as 1735. It consequently has an impressive record.
Tuesday afternoon, together with Remco Fluitman, I visited the afore -mentioned ‘Molétu Astronomijos Observatorija’ as is its Lithuanian name. Technician Sigitas Leisis spontaneously gave us a guided tour. This in spite of his, according to himself, scant knowledge of English. Lithuanianian and Russian, he does speak well, of course – both languages I am not really good at. During the tour, however, this man proved to have a more than sufficient command of English. Moreover technical Russian, apart from pronunciation is all but identical to English/Dutch, so this tour turned out to be most interesting! He showed us the big Cassegrain telescope, installed in 1991. This telescope is equatorially mounted. It features a 165 m mirror. The CCD camera is cooled down with liquid nitrogen, just like modern telescopes. Mr Leisis briefly opened the dome and had the telescope rotate and elevate. What a lovely sight this was! When we were leaving this man advised us to drop by again on a clear evening, because there often will be groups observing the sky. This was a stroke of luck we were happy to explore. That very night, though, the sky was clouded over.
The next night, Wednesday, we were more in luck, In the dark we were led around by the astronomer Saulius Lovcikas, who at that moment was visited by a group of 16-17 year-old students During the tour the telescope was being used for observation with the CCD camera, which is why in the tower the light was off. The dome was open, so we could see the clear starry sky. An awesome sight! Unfortunately, the 165 cm telescope being in use for scientific purposes, it was not available for sky-gazing visitors.
After the tour at the big telescope we went to the main building, where a film featuring space and the universe was shown. Afterwards the students gathered in small groups and our guide took them to the roof of the building to go stargazing. We could join the final group. On the roof stood a ‘ small’ 32 cm. telescope. Schools in Lithuania usually introduce their pupils to the ABC of astronomy in this way. Mr Lovcikas was so kind as to give not only the Lithuanian version but also extensively went on in English. Using a strong laser-pointer he, among other things, indicated Cassiopeia, Perseus, Ursa Major and Hercules. He also pointed out the planets Saturn and Mars. In the dark night, this went without a hitch – the green pointer seemed to reach the very stars themselves and everybody could have a look. I immensely enjoyed being able to see Saturns rings and a number of binaries.
The observatory is located on a 200 m high hill in an area of nature rich in lakes – quite beautiful and dark!!! In winter you can go down that hill on skis. Much of all this can already be seen with the naked eye. The only, very weak ‘light-pollution’ I could see that night, was the town of Molétai, at an average of 10 km to the south-west. In Lithuania outside the cities there is no street-lighting, and it being relatively thinly populated, there is hardly any "lightpollution". The villages, too, do not show more light than strictly necessary. It was a clear night and many starsystems were quite visible.In the Netherlands, due to lightpollution, these are hardly visible, if at all. When I informed Mr Lovcikas about this, he was a bit surprised to learn that ‘even relatively bright stars are not visible in The Netherlands?’ I told him that this is why in The Netherlands we mainly do radio-astronomy. For optical observation we have to leave for La Palma or Chile. When we were watching the stars, the International Space Station (ISS) happened to pass by, plus a number of satellites . Around 02.00 hrs the sky suddenly clouded over. A good time to go home. We can look back on a specially fascinating night!
Also worth mentioning is that the nearby museum for “ ethno kosmologie” also has the use of a Cassegrain 80 cm mirror telescope. It is mounted on a 42 m high tower. The previous day the kind museum employee had demonstrated it to us. On appointment the general public can have a look with this 80 cm telescope. The new museum, built in a futuristic style, is also worth a visit. It shows how, through the centuries, humanity observed the universe and how e.g. calendars were compiled. Upstairs in the glass tower they have varying exhibitions of modern art. From the tower, the view on the surrounding woods and lakes-area, of course is stunning, too. Moreover the guide is very enthousiastic and he has a good command of English.
For more information: Have a look at the following websites: http://www.itpa.lt/index.php , http://mao.itpa.lt en http://www.cosmos.lt Click on the English version of these websites.
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