Milky Way over Prades

It’s summer time in the northern hemisphere. Time to enjoy the Milky Way arch from a dark sky. In the small village of Prades some 200km south of Barcelona we find a protected dark sky area, the “Muntanyes de Prades i Serra de Montsant” Starlight Tourist Destination.

 

 

The image shows a small hermitage called Sant Roc that we can find hidden in the Prades forest. Surrounded by several pine trees, a typical mediterranean forest, we can stare at the beauty of our galaxy crossing the night sky. This place is well known as an Astronomical Viewpoint, visited by astronomy enthusiasts all over the year.

 

At the lower part of the image we can even see the Andromeda galaxy (M31). Can you spot it?

 

 

This image was captured the night of the 26th of July, just before midnight, minutes before the moonrise above the eastern horizon. It’s composed of 16 individual 20″ images that were stitched together as a mosaic giving the scene this curved appearance.

 

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