Sunday, December 17, 2006

A Day at the VLA

very large array
Today we drove to the VLA, a radio telescope situated on a radio-quiet plain at around 7000 feet. Some scenes from the movie Contact were filmed here. There're some pictures of Jodie Foster in the Visitors Center -- another kind of star.

dish garage
The 27 dishes ride around on train tracks in a Y pattern, 13 miles to an edge, and share this one hangar for maintenance.

magdalena, new mexico
The nearby town of Magdalena features a traditional soda fountain, Evett's, in what used to be a bank.

traditional soda fountain
(dawn, richard, cody, tara)