46 ASTRONOMY • DECEMBER 2019
After my soggy introductions, we
set off for our f light from Lima to
Cusco, Peru. Upon our arrival, we
quickly hopped onto buses and
headed north. On the way, we took
a detour to visit a small, rustic vil-
lage named Chinchero. Here, locals
have perfected the art of weaving
Peruvian clothing, which is often
made using alpaca, llama, or
sheep’s wool stained with naturally
colorful dyes.
Next, we ventured onward to
our hotel in Peru’s Yucay District, a
fertile farming region tucked away
in the Andean highlands in an area
also known as the Sacred Valley of
the Incas. Not only was the hotel
there beautiful and packed with
interesting native vegetation —
such as the tamarillo, an egg-
shaped tree tomato — but the hotel
staff was also incredibly accommo-
dating. At night, they even shut off
many of the hotel’s lights so we
could carry out some southern
stargazing under Sacred Valley’s
extremely dark skies.
Exploring the
southern sky
Because this was my first time in
the Southern Hemisphere, I initially
struggled to orient myself under
the new celestial tapestry — and
the sheer number of stars visible
without significant light pollution
didn’t help me get my bearings.
Fortunately, the stars Alpha and
Beta Centauri are fantastically easy
to spot. Aptly nicknamed “The
Southern Pointers,” these bright
stars served as a guide to the go-to
target for most first-time southern
observers: the constellation Crux
the Southern Cross.
After brief ly dissecting the
Southern Cross, we targeted the
nearby globular cluster Omega
Centauri (NGC 5139) through one
of the many telescopes brought by
the tour participants. From there,
we hopped around the sky tracking
down some of the brightest stars,
such as Spica in Virgo. A short
time later, we were treated to views
of Vega and Altair as they rose
above the mountains to the
northeast, providing us with a
glimpse of two of the three bright
stars that make up the easy-to-spot
asterism known (at least to us
northerners) as the Summer
Triangle. We also spent a good deal
of time poking around the constel-
lation Scorpius, stopping to admire
the Scorpion’s glowing heart, the
ruby-red star Antares.Then there was the Milky Way
itself. Flanked above by a brilliant
Jupiter and below by an easily vis-
ible Saturn, the cosmic river f lowed
across the dark sky with striking
clarity. We paid particular atten-
tion to the Milky Way’s shadowy
voids, caused by light-blocking gas
and dust between us and the bil-
lions of stars in our galaxy’s disk.
For the ancient Incas, these dark
clouds, rather than outlines traced
by bright stars, formed their
constellations.
Specifically, we had a great view
of the Incan constellation Yacana- Machu Picchu is hidden high in the
Peruvian mountains. The ancient Incan site
is thought to have been built in the 15th
century as the summer home for Pachacuti
Inca Yupanqui, the ninth ruler of the
Kingdom of Cusco. JAKE PARKS - Two children in Peruvian clothing pose
with their baby llamas on the narrow,
cobblestone streets of Cusco, Peru. JAKE PARKS
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