Dark Skies above Washington Island

When scanning a dark sky map (http://www.jshine.net/astronomy/dark_sky/) one in the Midwest quickly realizes that there are very few truly dark places.  Since I live two blocks from Chicago, I was excited recently to be invited to a friend's cabin on Washington Island off the tip of northern Door County, Wisconsin.  From the map, Washington Island appears to be an astronomy buff's dream destination.  I can confirm now from experience, that if you live in the Midwest and especially if you live near one of the urban centers, as do I, that Washington Island is well worth the drive and crossing via ferry.  The skies were as splendid as anywhere I have been.

I spent one evening with only a pair of field glasses in the middle of a prairie remnant scanning the Milky Way from one horizon to the other until the late summer chill made me hustle back into our cabin.  One evening I set up a C-8 on a deck at the water's edge where we skipped from Sagittarius to Hercules, Cygnus to Cassiopeia.  Since our hosts were new to astronomy I kept to the showy objects like Albireo, M51, M57, M81, and the like.  We visited a number of clusters, the names of which I can't recall there were so many.  There were lots of questions, but perhaps the best part was the realization that the light we were seeing in some cases had been traveling through space for millions of years, a fact that never fails to make me feel humble.

If you get the chance to visit the Island, make time to enjoy the wonderful scenery, food and people.  You won't believe that you are still in the Midwest as it feels more like Maine, with intimate harbors and small working boats side by side with pleasure boats.  Artisans are hidden all over the island, making ceramics and the like, but haven't yet taken over, and so fortunately the undeveloped feeling persists much like it was generations ago.