This past weekend I drove up to Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaii and marvelled at the barren landscape and the gorgeous vistas of the clouds below. The mountain top is one of the premier astronomy sites in the world. The site has dark nights, clear skies since it's in the middle of the ocean and relatively good weather. There are circular domes to house the telescopes all over the summit. Some are white, others silver, all make the landscape seem surreal and magical as they perch above the cloudline.
This visit to the mountain made me recall some photos I'd seen of astrolabes, medieval navigational instruments. When I'd seen the photos of these intricately designed instruments, I was stunned by their beauty. Before there GPS and Google Earth, compasses and astrolabes were how explorers found their way around the planet. An astrolabe can tell you where you are based on the position of the stars above your head and they held an almost magical power in the Middle Ages. It is a little model of heaven and earth and their regular dance with one another. From it, a navigator and determine his or her longitude and latitude, chart the regular course of the heavens and determine the day, month or even the year, all from a set of intersecting circles.
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