"It's Full of Stars!"

That quote, from "2001: A Space Oddysey," pretty much sums up our evening.

We revisited the VIS on Mauna Kea tonight. We worried that we had made the nearly 2-hour drive for nothing, since the sky was full of clouds when we arrived. After eating our picnic dinner of sandwiches and chips amid about 40 Asian tourists enjoying their rice, sushi and cup-o-noodles, we started talking about driving back home. One of the observatory employees told me that sometimes the clouds clear up after sunset, so we decided to stick it out a bit longer. What a good decision.

Steve and I hiked up a nearby hill (taking us to just under 10,000 feet, we were guessing) to check out the sunset, which was not at all visible from the VIS. There were several clouds, but that just added to the cool sunset. After it was over, we hiked back down to where Evelyn and the boys were waiting.

The clouds indeed cleared up, and the boys had another chance to peek at Venus, Jupiter (complete with at least 4 moons) and Saturn before the stars starting appearing, and appearing, and appearing. By the time the star tour began at 8, the sky was so crowded with stars it was hard to follow the laser pointer. Our guide must have pointed our 25 constellations, if not more. Plus, we could see the Milky Way -- totally awesome. (I tried to take pictures, but my little camera was overwhelmed by the sight and just showed me total blackness.)

It was amazing the difference it made to have no moon on this visit, versus our nearly full moon visit of a couple weeks ago. Wow. (Oh, it was also colder tonight, dropping to narly 50.)

On our way to Mauna Kea, we stopped to take a little hike up a place called "Hairy Hill." (It has a long Hawai'ian name too, but I forgot it and am too lazy to look it up.) Mostly, it was a dirty red hill, and we didn't go far. Evelyn and the boys were not too thrilled about climbing it, and it really wasn't worth pushing the point. Probably would have nice views at sunset too, I'd predict. This shot looks down on the hill from our perch on the side of Mauna Kea.

And here's a shot of sunset from the same point.