Experiencing India's First Dark Sky Reserve

It was 1:30 AM in the last week of September. Location: Hanle, a remote place in Ladakh.

It's an open area and pitch dark. It's very cold and the temperature reads -2°C. The wind is only making it worse. The 6 layers of clothing is not helping much! With eyes, nose and mouth exposed, the cold is taking a hit on the face.

Life after life by Raymond Moody and Hindu scriptures

The book "Life after life" by Raymond A Moody is a fascinating read, where the author describes the "Near Death Experience" encounters of many people. In this post, I draw a parallel of those experiences with what is described in Hindu scriptures.

Pure Vegetarian homestays in Karnataka

Whenever I start searching for homestays, I look for the homestays which serve only vegetarian food. It is not easy to get a list of such homestays. I have to literally go through reviews of every homestay (barring a few) and find out if they serve only veg or not. With that exercise, I end up having a list of such homestays in Karnataka. That prompted me to create a list and post it in my blog so that it can help anyone looking for only-veg homestays.

Astronomy Visual Observation Report - 18 May 2021

Date: 18-May-2021

Time: 9PM to 12AM IST 

Location: Bengaluru, India 

Equipment: Orion SkyQuest XT8g GoTo Dobsonian Telescope; 12.5mm eyepiece

In previous two observations, I mainly concentrated on open clusters and double stars. So this time, my objective was globular clusters. But I also observed a few OCs and nebulae.

Breath and Meditation workshop from Art of Living

I had watched breathing and meditation techniques in YouTube videos. But wanted to learn from a Guru (teacher) so that I get a satisfaction that I learnt with a proper technique and I get to ask questions and get clarifications. When my engineering classmate Guruprasad mentioned that the Art of Living is conducting a workshop on the same through online, I decided to enroll for this program. Especially during these covid times, it was more than necessary to learn proper breathing techniques and meditation.

Astronomy Visual Observation Report - 7 Feb 2021

Date: 7-Feb-2021 

Time: 7pm to 10pm IST

Location: Bengaluru, India

Equipment: Orion SkyQuest XT8g GoTo Dobsonian Telescope with 12.5mm eyepiece

Last time my observation was mainly focused on clusters. This time it was double stars. Here's the list of double stars observed. 

19 Lyncis

38 Gemini Castor (looked beautiful) 

Acamar (Eridanus)

32 Eri

Beta Monocerous (this was tripple stars)

Eta puppis

Kappa puppis

Beta Andromeda

Delta Cephei

Eta Cassiopeiae (white and reddish stars)

Gamma Ari (2 bright stars together)

Lambda Ari

Psi piscium

Zeta piscium

Rigel (beautiful sight)

Mintaka

Iota Cancri

Zeta Cancri (very close to each other)

145 Canis Majoris aka Winter Albireo

54 leonis (very close to each other)

Gamma leonis (very close to each other)

However I couldn't resolve the following double stars:

Adhara

Gamma Cet

Sigma Cassiopeiae

Astronomy Visual Observation Report - 24 Jan 2021

This is the report of the Visual Observation through my new Telescope.