These days it's tough for those of us who live in big cities to find reasonably accessible dark skies. Most try to tough it out in state parks or pull off the side of the road somewhere, neither of which are the best options in my opinion. The best I could do was a 5 1/2 hour drive to my grandmother-in-law's lake house in Del Rio, TX. A few weekends ago though I hit the astrophotography jackpot! I discovered and subsequently visited the Farrell Family Ranch in Meridian, TX. I had such a great experience that I had to give them a shout out here!
The ranch boasts Bortle 2/3 skies, a nice private cabin to stay at, and some of the nicest people I've ever met. Weekend stays are very reasonably priced and the scenery is picturesque (I wish I had the right setup to take pictures of the Milky Way!). They have a lot of wildlife as well which makes it good for terrestrial photos. Unlike a lot of places, they are very well set up to handle (and actually encourage) astrophotography!
Over the time I spent there I was able to capture Thor's Helmet which is a magnitude 11.45 emissions nebula in the constellation Canis Major. It is ~12,000 light years from Earth and is ~30 light years in diameter. The dark skies paid off as this image has the least amount of noise I've dealt with and for that reason this is the most cropped image I've presented thus far! This "winged" helmet is my favorite target yet!
For those interested in visiting the Farrell Family Ranch, here's their contact info (they know me there now so feel free to drop my name when you contact them)!
Website:
https://farrell-ranch.com/Email:
[email protected]Phone: (254) 315 - 0303
Instagram: @farrellranch
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