Visited here after what was a pretty poor day off exploring with man gone wrong. Although we did see a guy casually riding on a penny farthing push bike in the Essex country lanes earlier in the day which made our day. The day had started off cold and frosty and beautiful and stayed that way. So we decided to stop here on the way home as man gone wrong got caught a few years earlier before he has even got in. Some bloke from the observatory drove past as he got out his car and asked what he was doing. I had previously visited in 2014 but was more than happy to go back. We arrived as dusk was setting in. And we waited for sunset. As the sun dropped so did the temperature rapidly. It was bitterly cold but still always worth it here. On my last visit we saw the old sunken dish and the ones still in use further up the road. But this time we just looked at the main railed dishes.
The observatory here was opened in 1957 under the guidance of Marin Ryle of the Radio Astronomy Group of the Cavendish Laboratory.
When you are on the site you can tell it had a military feel to it with some little remains dotted about. Turns out it was an old munitions depot.
The observatory is home to a number of radio telescopes like 5km Ryle telescope and the one we visited known as the one mile telescope. I don't think it's quite a mile though, but just short. It's situated next to the old Bedford to Cambridge line. So they used some of the old track bed for the 5km telescope and the Cambridge Low Frequency Synthesis Telescope.
The observatory here was opened in 1957 under the guidance of Marin Ryle of the Radio Astronomy Group of the Cavendish Laboratory.
When you are on the site you can tell it had a military feel to it with some little remains dotted about. Turns out it was an old munitions depot.
The observatory is home to a number of radio telescopes like 5km Ryle telescope and the one we visited known as the one mile telescope. I don't think it's quite a mile though, but just short. It's situated next to the old Bedford to Cambridge line. So they used some of the old track bed for the 5km telescope and the Cambridge Low Frequency Synthesis Telescope.
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