Our last night at the telescope

The story so far: on the first night we were able to observe until 02:00 before the weather forced us to close. The following three nights we were confined to the Residencia, the place where they keep all the astronomers when they are not observing. Much to our surprise, this morning we awoke to a sky only sparsely covered by clouds, instead of being in the middle of one. Maybe we have a chance of observing something tonight?

== 19:30 ==

As the weather has cleared somewhat on Roque de Los Muchachos, La Palma, we have received permission to go to the telescope tonight. We’ve just arrived and started taking the first couple of calibration images with much enthusiasm. 

A bit about the telescope itself: we’re using a telescope called the Isaac Newton Telescope (INT). It is a Cassegrain reflector telescope with a ~2.5m primary mirror that weighs ~4000kg! 

It takes a while for the telescope to take all the calibration images (biases, arcs and flats), so we were able to enjoy the sunset right before -hopefully- a very busy night. 

== 22:00 ==

Unfortunately the weather has taken a turn for the worse. We cannot open the dome of the telescope as the humidity is too high. We’ve had our first cups of coffee and are settling in for the night, while keeping an eye on the humidity sensor.

As tonight will be our last night at the telescope and we’ve had bad luck with the weather the last couple of days, we are very hopeful to observe some galaxies tonight. So far we were able to observe only one galaxy before we had to close on the first night. At this point we will be grateful for any data that comes in, even one more galaxy would double our current sample size!

== 00:45 ==

We’re still not able to open, humidity is at 100% and we cannot see any stars. The highlight of the last couple of hours was exploring the library in the INT and listening to an old cassette tape of Joseph and the technicolour dream coat. None of the other tapes work.

== 04:00 ==

We’ve had a popcorn and pizza break, drank multiple cups of coffee and explored most of the telescope building. However, unfortunately we’ve not been able to use the telescope today – the weather gods seem determined to prevent us from getting any data. With any luck we’ll be back next year to try again.