{"id":53727,"date":"2022-09-16T08:09:51","date_gmt":"2022-09-16T07:09:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/travindy.com\/?p=53727"},"modified":"2022-09-16T08:11:05","modified_gmt":"2022-09-16T07:11:05","slug":"seeing-stars-the-astronomical-rise-of-australian-dark-sky-tourism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/travindy.com\/news\/2022\/09\/seeing-stars-the-astronomical-rise-of-australian-dark-sky-tourism\/","title":{"rendered":"Seeing stars: the astronomical rise of Australian dark-sky tourism"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" src=\"https:\/\/travindy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/dark-sky-tourism-audtralia.jpg\" alt=\"dark-sky tourism australia\" class=\"wp-image-53728\" srcset=\"https:\/\/travindy.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/dark-sky-tourism-audtralia.jpg 800w, https:\/\/travindy.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/dark-sky-tourism-audtralia-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/travindy.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/dark-sky-tourism-audtralia-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/travindy.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/dark-sky-tourism-audtralia-150x100.jpg 150w, https:\/\/travindy.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/dark-sky-tourism-audtralia-696x464.jpg 696w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Australia has a relative abundance of astro-tourism destinations, and a growing movement to help protect their darkness.<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>An Aboriginal dreamtime story tells of the fire magic in the foot of Kambughuda, protecting her younger sisters from the hunter Nyeeruna.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The story doesn\u2019t just exist in the oral tradition of the world\u2019s oldest living cultures, it plays out in the night sky; the hunter Nyeeruna is known in the western astrological tradition as Orion; Kambughuda\u2019s fire magic is the red star Aldebaran and her little sisters the Pleiades constellation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Krystal De Napoli, a Gomeroi astrophysicist told us the story \u2013 which demonstrates Indigenous Australians knew of the variable stars around Orion\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/science\/articles\/2014\/04\/21\/3985298.htm\">long before European astronomers<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 at Nocturna, the dark sky party on Tasmania\u2019s east coast, which concludes Hobart\u2019s\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/science\/2022\/aug\/20\/not-some-weird-elitist-class-the-scientists-bringing-an-urgent-message-to-the-streets-of-hobart?utm_term=Autofeed&amp;CMP=soc_568&amp;utm_medium=Social&amp;utm_source=Twitter\">Beaker Street science and art festival<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The constellations \u201care our books\u201d, De Napoli says. But this library is being hidden by light pollution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Over&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.science.org\/doi\/10.1126\/sciadv.1600377\" rel=\"nofollow\">80% of the world\u2019s population&nbsp;<\/a>now live in areas where they cannot see stars. Beyond depriving humans of starlight, light pollution threatens the creatures of the night; bats,&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2021\/dec\/18\/a-995-decline-what-caused-australias-bogong-moth-catastrophe\">bogong moths<\/a>,&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/australia-news\/2021\/feb\/17\/dead-and-stranded-turtle-hatchlings-alarm-queensland-officials\">turtles<\/a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2020\/feb\/22\/why-lights-going-out-fireflies-conservation-pollution\">fireflies<\/a>&nbsp;are all affected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But at the same time as \u201csky glow\u201d increasingly obscures the stars, Australians and New Zealanders are seeking out darkness for stargazing in ever-greater numbers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The Mackenzie region in New Zealand\u2019s south island has seen a 300% increase in visitors since Aoraki\/Mount Cook national park and the Mackenzie Basin was named an International Dark Sky Reserve in 2012.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>President of Dark Skies Tasmania, Landon Bannister, says the rise of astro-tourism happened organically. He sees it as part of a broader shift toward reconnecting with nature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s really important to embrace darkness. One of the most beautiful things about stargazing is to just take the time to let your eyes dark adapt. We spend so much time under artificial light now.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The desire to see stars benefits rural communities. Urban billboards, car parks and multi-story office buildings lit up throughout the night are some of the biggest sources of light pollution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Bannister says you have to drive around three hours from cities like Melbourne and Sydney to see the Milky Way \u2013 and even further from cities in the US and Europe. But in places like New Zealand and Tasmania, you only need to drive 30 minutes out of town to see the drifts of light that give the Milky Way its name.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/travel\/2022\/sep\/12\/seeing-stars-the-astronomical-rise-of-australian-dark-sky-tourism\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><strong>Continue reading&#8230;<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>This is an excerpt from an article by Natasha May, originally published by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/travel\/2022\/sep\/12\/seeing-stars-the-astronomical-rise-of-australian-dark-sky-tourism\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">The Guardian<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Australia has a relative abundance of astro-tourism destinations, and a growing movement to help protect their darkness.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":53728,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,130,3880,141],"tags":[3309,3881,3882,2462],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Seeing stars: the astronomical rise of Australian dark-sky tourism<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Australia has a relative abundance of astro-tourism destinations, and a growing movement to help protect their darkness.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/travindy.com\/news\/2022\/09\/seeing-stars-the-astronomical-rise-of-australian-dark-sky-tourism\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Seeing stars: the astronomical rise of Australian dark-sky tourism\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Australia has a relative abundance of astro-tourism destinations, and a growing movement to help protect their darkness.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/travindy.com\/news\/2022\/09\/seeing-stars-the-astronomical-rise-of-australian-dark-sky-tourism\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Travindy\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/travindy\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/travindy\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2022-09-16T07:09:51+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-09-16T07:11:05+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/travindy.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/dark-sky-tourism-audtralia.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"800\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"533\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Travindy\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@travindy\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@Travindy\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"The Guardian\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/travindy.com\/news\/2022\/09\/seeing-stars-the-astronomical-rise-of-australian-dark-sky-tourism\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/travindy.com\/news\/2022\/09\/seeing-stars-the-astronomical-rise-of-australian-dark-sky-tourism\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Travindy\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/travindy.com\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/79576b26c03e84ac969c6cf7ad8118bb\"},\"headline\":\"Seeing stars: the astronomical rise of Australian dark-sky tourism\",\"datePublished\":\"2022-09-16T07:09:51+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-09-16T07:11:05+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/travindy.com\/news\/2022\/09\/seeing-stars-the-astronomical-rise-of-australian-dark-sky-tourism\/\"},\"wordCount\":435,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/travindy.com\/news\/#organization\"},\"keywords\":[\"Australia\",\"light noise\",\"light pollution\",\"Nature protection\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Destinations\",\"Environmental issues\",\"Pollution\",\"Tours &amp; 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