The Area of Darkness

and a visit to Astro Adventures


From the walk diary:

"The walk back to Marie`s was about five miles long, but – as arranged earlier – I stopped off to visit Murray and Valerie Barber. I had passed their cottage as I walked along the road to Marie`s the day before. It is only 680 m from the turbines. He and his wife and a partner run Astronomy Holidays. They had sunk all their savings into this venture, moving from Sussex. They chose Bradworthy because of its isolation. High up and lonely, their site has one of the darkest night skies in England, perfect for their plans, free from light pollution. When they bought their cottage, and the self catering units with it, they had no idea that turbines were planned nearby. They did all the usual searches, but it didn`t show up on those, and no one they spoke to told them about the wind farm About a month after they moved in, the diggers moved in across the road, and the turbines began to be put up.

They were very welcoming to me, gave me tea and chocolate biscuits, and lent me a battery charger for my batteries. Their daughter who was doing media studies helped set up the video so I could have a conversation with them.

I asked them about the noise. It can be very loud at times, especially at night, they said, and also when when the air is calm. Like many other people I spoke to, they have suspicions that the turbines are driven by electricity when the wind speed is low.

They took me out to see their telescope which was very interesting (I did O.U a few years ago and Astonomy was my favourite course) They said they were fortunate in one way, in that the people who came on their holidays weren`t coming for the countryside, they were interested in high tech imaging. It would be a different matter if the turbines ever had to have lights – that would be a disaster. As far as noise was concerned, they said the worst noise of all was when the turbines “feathered”. Marie had said the same thing. “You can`t miss that,” she said, “it will wake you up in the night.”

They walked some of the way back with me, and we paused by the gate to the turbines. The wind had changed, and the turbines were facing in a different direction now. The swishing noise they made was much louder now.

At the corner by Stowford cross we said goodbye and I walked on."


Here is a link to their website:  I thoroughly recommend it

www.astroadventures.co.uk

there is a link on their website that shows the areas of darkest night skies.

And this is a link to an article in the Telegraph online  about them on the web:


Go to this page on the CPRE website, and click on the South West map,  (download as pdf) and you will see another map that shows the areas that have the least light pollution (not that they mainly  in the area of search for wind turbines

Here is a link to the Devon County Council website and a map (download as pdf) that shows the area of search:
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