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Perhaps the best thing about this trip is that you do not have to ask either Elon Musk or Richard Branson for a ride on one of their rockets. All you need to do is head about 500 km north-west from Sydney, Australia to the small but prosperous and pleasant town of Coonabarabran. Your voyage through the solar system will begin about 200 km before you even get there. The way we’re going, that will be at another small town called Merriwa where you will find Pluto.
But hold on. Let’s go back a little to where this whole business started. Twenty-seven kilometers from Coonabarabran is Siding Spring Observatory, on the edge of Warrumbungle National Park. It is Australia’s premier optical and infrared astronomical observatory and is operated by the Australian National University. Along with its “parent” observatory at Mount Stromlo near Canberra, it constitutes the most important facility for such observation in the Southern Hemisphere.
The white dome of the 37 metre telescope is hard to miss as you approach the observatory. Photo: The Bear
Siding Spring Observatory lies on the traditional country of the Gamilaraay/Kamilaroi language group who have occupied this area for at least 20,000 years. A traditional travel route passes through the mountains, with the distinctive peaks used for navigation. Dreaming stories, ceremonies and art reveal that the Aboriginal people of Australia could have been the world’s earliest astronomers. They used the stars to guide them, to track the seasons, and to ascertain the availability of certain foods.
Commissioned after it had become clear that Mount Stromlo was suffering from excessive light pollution, the observatory was built on Mount Woorat in the Warrumbungles and officially opened on 5 April 1965. At this point the Australian National University had already set up three telescopes. Some 60 others were added to the site over the years, and perhaps its greatest astronomical contribution was the discovery by Professor Brian Schmidt that the universe is expanding at an accelerating rate.
So far, so big. Now for the scale model.
Mike is suitably impressed by Saturn’s ringed majesty. The planets could do with a coat of paint. Photo: The Bear
The idea for The World’s Largest Virtual Solar System Drive (or Ride, as I prefer to call it) came from Coonabarabran astronomer John Shobbrook in 1997 and a grant from the Federal Government ten years later allowed it to become a reality. The idea was simple: to build a scale model using the dome of the 37 meter Anglo-Australian Telescope to represent the Sun. That meant the model would be 38 million times smaller than the original. It consists of roadside billboards on five routes approaching the observatory, depicting individual planets. Each billboard also includes information on the planet, its size and its distance from the sun. The routes begin in Dubbo, Birriwa north of Gulgong, Tamworth and Bellata south of Moree as well as Merriwa.
At scale, the Earth does not look particularly impressive. Photo: The Bear
The Pluto we found at Merriwa is one of the opening stops, then. And yes, everyone knows that Pluto has been demoted and is no longer considered a planet – but it still was in 2007! Should you not be arriving by one of those five routes, you can find the planets closest to the sun, beginning with Jupiter, by following Observatory Road on its 27-kilometre run from Coonabarabran out to the observatory. A bonus is that you will be riding through the outliers of the extraordinary and beautiful Warrumbungle Range on a lovely, twisting road. Beware of wildlife, however!
And here’s the Sun, err the big telescope. Photo: The Bear
It was not long after our recent devastating floods that Mike Grant and I rode out to the observatory recently. There was relatively little evidence of the inundations which had washed away an entire town along with doing much other damage. The most obvious effect of the floods was the condition of the roads. Even in a State where we often complain about the lack of road maintenance, they were appalling. I suspect it will take well over a year before they are back in a truly serviceable condition.
Be that as it may, it was a terrific ride helped along by the effective suspension of the Suzuki GSX-S1000GT I was riding. We took the Putty Road, a popular bike route, north from Sydney before turning into the Golden Highway and then the Black Stump Way. As we got closer to Coonabarabran, we were reminded not only of the size of the Solar System but also the extent of the plain we were crossing, the flattest expanse in the southern hemisphere. The Warrumbungles with their steep hills seem like a wrinkle in a giant’s tablecloth.
Yep, the roads need work all right. For miles and miles, where the flood’s inland sea stretched. Photo: The Bear
But never mind that, or the roads; head on up Coonabarabran way and pace the Solar System out for yourself.
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