SUNSET LIMITED
landscape of rocky canyons, red hills
and weirdly shaped agave flowers, the
soldiers stationed here must have felt as
though they had been posted to the far
side of the moon.
Even today, Fort Davis feels a long
way from anywhere, but these days, its
isolation is a blessing. The town’s remote
location means minimal light pollution
- ideal for stargazing. At the McDonald
Observatory just outside town, three of
America’s most powerful telescopes scan
the skies, researching topics from stellar
spectroscopy to interplanetary physics.
Thanks to its regular ‘star parties’, the
observatory is also one of the few places
where ordinary folk can peer through a
million-dollar telescope into interstellar
space. Several nights a week, the
observatory opens its doors to the public,
and astronomers point out the coloured
dots of Jupiter and Mars, the fuzzy
Crab Nebula and the white points of
Sirius and Arcturus. One by one, visitors
gaze through the powerful telescopes,
gasping at the endless ocean of
constellations overhead.
Two days later, the skies have returned to
china-blue as the train rolls out of the
‘On the train,
you’re a
participant in
the journey’
CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT
Conductor Gerry Ontiveros
at Alpine station; travelling
through the New Mexico
desert; McDonald
Observatory opens its
doors for a ‘star party’