Grassholme Observatory

For Christmas, Dan and Abi gave a trip to an observatory near Barnard's Castle. Everyone I spoke to assumed it was Kielder Observatory, to the point that that's where I thought we were going until I checked the tickets a couple of days ago. It turned out that we were visiting Grassholme Observatory. 

Abi, Dan, and I set off there, this evening, stopping in Kirkby Stephen for dinner (see first Extra), and then drove on up to the observatory, which is right by Grassholme Reservoir. 

It transpires that this observatory was set up by Gary Fildes, who also set up Kielder, and was invited to do so by the owners of the reservoir when he retired from Kielder.

It was a great evening, starting with a talk and followed by some viewing through their main telescope (see second Extra*), when we saw both Jupiter and Betelgeuse.

After that, we were supposed to use some other telescopes but the cloud had come over. However, Grassholme has what it describes as a "disproportionately high number of cloudless nights" and offer a guarantee that if you're viewing is spoilt by clouds, you can return for free which we most certainly will!

Interestingly, Kielder has a disproportionately high number of cloudy nights. But when I enquired why, no one seemed to know. 

*Of interest only to fans of 'Phineas and Ferb', as we walked into the room with the telescope in, Abi put on the voice of Dr Doofenschmirz and exclaimed "A self-destruct button".