Star Trails at El Nido
It isn’t very often that I get to get out of major population centers. Although I have been to numerous place in China, these places tend to be filled with a lot of people, thus large cities are built. The Philippines, is not different though it is a bit easier to find small town where you can just be by yourself. When night fell in El Nido, I was amazed at the sight of numerous stars. The lack of city lights which contributes to light pollution here works wonders for stargazing. When you are in the city, everything is too bright there such that you only see the brightest of stars. This is in Manila, but for even more luminous cities such as Singapore or Hong Kong, you probably can’t see any especially when you are in the city itself. Visitors to Hong Kong can probably try Lantau Island or the nearby islands.
My Version of Deep Field
A sky filled with stars is something I only see in the Philippines, being less developed than other countries. I was also lucky that the clouds have started to clear up giving me an excellent view of the northern sky. I have always wanted to do star trails but I never got enough stars to do it as I was always in a bright place. El Nido is different. We had to walk further away from the town itself for it to get dark enough. We found an unfinished structure which was perfect for some long exposure activity. I took several photos some lasting around 25 minutes, probably the longest shot I had ever taken. Unfortunately, my tripod wasn’t exactly very tall and neither was it very stable either. This was the clearest photo I got. It was so dark that I couldn’t even tell that my horizon wasn’t level until that photo came out 25 minutes later, oh well, it was fun doing it.
[xmlgm {http://www.worldwanderings.net/kml/ElNido.kmz} zoom=19]