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00:00 site local. Astronomical dark, moon down. Sun -79°. Moon 1% waning crescent. Median SQM 21.9. No long moonless night in the published window

Book a Night

Arriving

The last eleven kilometres

Getting here is part of the product. It is also the part people most often underestimate, so this page is specific rather than welcoming.

Elevation
2,480 m
Nearest town
74 km
Graded dirt
11 km
Mobile signal
None
A ridge in high desert at last light, an observatory dome silhouetted on the summit, ochre band along the horizon.
The last rise before the site. The lit line is the road.ESO/J. Girard · CC BY 4.0
HighwayJunction11 km graded dirtunlit, two fordsMeseta de Ilaró · 2,480 mUmbra
Schematic, not to scale. The dashed section is the part that decides whether your car is suitable.

The road

Leave the highway at the junction and the surface changes almost immediately. The last 11 kilometres are graded dirt with a washboard surface and two shallow fords that are dry most of the year. A standard hire car makes it slowly in daylight. A low car in the dark is a bad idea, and that is why the transfer exists.

There is no lighting on that stretch and there will not be. Drive it before dusk if you can.

The altitude

2,480 m affects most people very little. A minority sleep badly the first night and a few arrive with a headache. Both are more likely if you drive up from the coast in one day. Arrive in the afternoon and plan nothing demanding for the first evening — which is also why the solar session exists.

The cold

Pre-dawn in June and July, minus six is normal and minus eleven happens. In December it rarely drops below plus two. The wind is the part people underestimate: constant between dusk and about eleven, then it drops. Bring more than you think, including gloves you can work a focuser in.

White light

No white light anywhere on site after dusk. That includes your phone. A white screen costs you about twenty minutes of dark adaptation and costs everyone else the same for as long as it is visible. Phones in red mode at minimum brightness are fine, we hand out red film at the start of every session, and we do ask twice.

This website has a red mode for the same reason. It is in the header.

The Milky Way rising over a flat dark plateau, a low warm glow along the horizon.
Once the glow goes, this is what you came for.ESO/Y. Beletsky · CC BY 4.0