Best location for stars with naked eye

[blarznik]

These places seem great. Do places like these actually appear this way with the naked eye?

 

[ideasrule]

WOW, that Aurora is amazing. If I saw something like that, I'd think that I was on another planet, or perhaps in another universe.

I can't talk about the Aurora photo because I've never seen one before, but the Milky Way can definitely look as impressive as it does in the photo. The photo captures more stars than the human eye can see, but it doesn't capture the subjective splendour of the Milky Way. At a truly dark site, the Milky Way is a shining river of light, with obvious dark patches of dust. It's bright enough to cast soft shadows. When it's rising, it sometimes fools observers into thinking dawn arrived.

 

[Drakkith]

Yes. Even going 15-20 minutes outside of Shreveport I can actually see the milky way and the dark patches of dust clouds running through it. In the light pollution map that I have the area I go to is in the yellow to green area. It runs, from most light pollution to least, White, Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Black. In the yellow-green where i go, I can EASILY see the glow from the city still, so I'm sure that a very very dark area would be amazing to go to.

 

[davenn]

Yes. Even going 15-20 minutes outside of Shreveport I can actually see the milky way and the dark patches of dust clouds running through it. In the light pollution map that I have the area I go to is in the yellow to green area. It runs, from most light pollution to least, White, Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Black. In the yellow-green where i go, I can EASILY see the glow from the city still, so I'm sure that a very very dark area would be amazing to go to.

WOW Shreveport ... if its one in the lower USA ... dang been a while since I stormchased through that area :)

Dark skies ohhh yeah... the outback of Australia ! the skies are just stunning. Its an astronomer's dream. To coin an old phrase..." it feels like you just reach out and touch them"

Aurorae... love 'em unfortunately since moving to Australia 11 yrs ago I don't see them any more :(

From my old home in southern New Zealand, I saw and photo'ed many of them


a link to just a few pix I have on my www site...
http://www.sydneystormcity.com/aurora.htm

cheers
Dave

 

[russ_watters]

Neither of those pictures would be what you would see with the naked eye - both were taken with cameras and long (longer than what equals what your eye gets) exposure.