Astro 28Z – Field
Astronomy at Mono
Hot Springs
1. Cheap!
• The class is cheap! A course like this, with nice homecooked meals, would cost you $400 in the “real world”,
so enjoy your good fortune to be able to do this for
about $50 total, including tuition fee for the 1 unit
• Your camping fee must be paid to the College Bank
using the Pay Voucher outside my Office Door.
• This must be done before you can go. The camping fee
is $10. I paid for the 4 camp sites out of my own
pocket, and will be reimbursed for those expenses by
the College when I turn in the receipts. I’ll be paid out
of the “Astro Clearing Account” which receives your
payment
Liability Waivers
• The Dean will not permit this course to go
unless I turn in signed waivers from EVERYone,
I must do that early this coming week! Anyone
missing this pre-trip meeting is subject to
being dropped. Anyone not signing the waiver
cannot go on the trip, even if they are not in
the class
• Sign the waivers, and keep the front page for
yourself (just tear off the top page and keep)
2. Maps!
• You are responsible for getting yourself to
Mono Hot Springs (no yellow school bus!).
Think of it like getting yourself to any other
class in the morning. No valet service!
• I have a map packet I’ve prepared, with the
suggested route to follow to get there.
It’s 202 miles, and about 4hr 40min of
driving. Pretty, but slow in the Sierra,
especially the last 12 miles
Campsites
•
•
•
•
•
We have 2 single, and 1 double site…
Site #14 – 6 people, 2 vehicles
Site #17 – 6 people, 2 vehicles
Site #30 – 12 people, 4 vehicles
Excess vehicles will pay the ranger extra, I think
it’s $10/car. You can divvy that amongst your
fellow campers when the ranger visits us
Saturday morning.
• Site #30 is also our “kitchen”, and probably our
astro telescope viewing area as well.
So….
• We have 26 students, plus one instructor, 2
volunteers helping in the Kitchen. That’s 29 total
• We have paid for 8 vehicles total, one of which is
the college van I will be driving. The van will have
me, my lab assistant, and my kitchen help, and all
of our astro and cooking gear and food, and will
not have room for other students, alas.
• I plan to arrive before sunset on Friday
…We’ll Need to Carpool!
• It’s one of the main tasks for today
• I’ll now give you time to get to know each
other and decide on car pools, exchange
phone numbers etc.
Schedule
•
•
Sept 12 at Sat 9am - 2pm in Room 705 and the planetarium (room 706)
Pre-trip meeting. Distribute maps, carpooling, logistics, food, and lecture/planetarium presentation on the formation of the
solar system, and star formation. Mandatory if you want a good grade!
•
•
Sept 18 5pm - Fri evening
Arrive at the campground as soon as you can. The central site for us is the dual campsite #30, where the "kitchen" will be and
the scopes near the river bank. I'll fix dinner and we'll eat before by the time it's dark at 7pm or so. Then, be ready for Friday
night around the telescope, lecture on stars, the summer Milky Way and demonstration of the sun's place within the galaxy.
•
•
Sept 19 - Saturday
8am: Group Breakfast prep (French Crepes!).
•
9:45am - Hike to Doris Lake, stopping for "micro-lectures" along the way with chemical composition of the Earth's crust, origin
of elements.
•
Lunch - On the cliffs above the lake, with more lectures on the differences between the inner planets geology and planetary
evolution.
•
2 pm - Return to camp, prepare for 2nd hike to Little Eden Spring, (1/2 mile uphill hike). We'll sit in the hot springs (big enough
for the whole class if no one else is there). Lectures on the formation and evolution of California and the Sierra. Contrast with
that of other planets and the moon.
•
4 pm - Lecture on cosmology, the origin of the universe at Little Eden Hot Spring. Hike back to camp (about 1/2 mile)
•
6pm - Dinner prep at camp. Asian rice/vege's a'la Nolthenius!
•
8:00pm - At the telescopes for more studies; star clusters, galaxies. More explorations of the Milky Way galaxy, showing stars
with known planetary systems as a bonus.
•
•
Sept 20 - Sunday
8am: Breakfast prep, enjoy meal at Campsite #30
•
9:30am Lecture at the hot springs right across the river, on planetary processes relevant to hot spring formation, and final pages
of the handout lecture material on origin/evolution of the inner planets and principles which apply. Distribute final exams with
instructions.
What Will We Do?
• Nice thing about this Astro 28 is there’s no driving once
you arrive. It’s just some short hikes
• We’ll show you the stars, talk about the formation of
the planets and the chemical elements that make them
up,
• I’ll have a computerized telescope
• We’ll do day hikes to Doris Lake, where I’ll discuss
planetary processes and how they contrast between
planets
• and to two different hot springs, including Little Eden,
perched on a hillside with a panoramic view of the
Sierra
• We’ll talk about the origin of the Universe there too!
Fri night Telescope viewing! (looking
out, not in!)
The Veil Nebula
My French Crepes Breakfast Saturday
Morning!
What Will We Do?
Lecture at Doris Lake after Saturday Breakfast;
about a 2 mile hike to get there
Where I’ll talk about planetary
processes
Doris Lake, after our lecture there
After a returnt o camp, A few miles of
hiking, a bit of scrambling to get to
Little Eden
Little Eden – great lecture spot for
Afternoon
Saturday night telescope viewing. Milky
Way and the Sagittarius region: star
clusters, nebulae, stellar processes and the
variety of different stars
You’ll be up till late, up for Breakfast. Rest up before you go!
Pedro Hot Springs is just across the
river from our campground, for
Sunday morning’s final lecture
Take Home Final
• The last thing, about noon, we hand out the
final exams. These are take-home finals which
you complete at home. They MUST be done
and printed and snail-mailed or handed in to
me.
• No email submissions that I have to print !
• Mult choice, and also essay questions.
• Take notes during the lectures!