Radically Retired

Tag: Skies

  • Shine On …

    Shine On …

    Last week, we travelled north to visit our daughter and her family as well as friends in the area we called home for over 20 years.

    My feature photo is from Wednesday night at about 8pm. We were returning from a wonderful evening meal at a fave restaurant in a neighbouring town. Our daughter was driving and pulled over when I spotted the almost full moon and wanted a shot. I used the native camera app on my phone zoomed in at 8x. I didn’t have a tripod with me, so handheld wasn’t stable enough for the 8x, thus the slightly wobbly moon in my feature photo.

    On Saturday, hubs and I were returning home, and as dusk arrived, I saw the big harvest moon rising over the horizon.

    I pulled over to an approach, attached the new moment 240 mm mobile lens to my phone, shot using the 4x lens in my phone camera and the Moment Pro camera app, and voila!

    🎶Shine on, shine on harvest moon 🎶
  • Well Hello, STEVE!

    Well Hello, STEVE!

    For two days last week, Aurora was extremely strong and extended as far south as central Texas (almost four hundred miles north of us here in the RGV)

    One phenomenon that can accompany extreme solar storms, is known as STEVE – a term coined in 2016 in Alberta Canada (our neighbouring province).

    STEVE is an acronym for Strong Thermal Emission Velocity Enhancement and usually appears as a diagonal thin band of purple with sometimes green accompaniment across the night sky on a night when Miss Aurora is showing off farther north.

    I like to think “Big Steve” visited us last week.

    My nephew (a geologist) passed my photo along to his friend (a geo-scientist) who concurred that this was indeed STEVE.

    Below are photos of Aurora (from both nights) that our grandson sent to us from his home in central Saskatchewan, Canada.

    The first three were Tuesday night and the last three were from Wednesday night.

    I’m so pleased, that at age 19, he appreciates nature as much as he does.