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The map is helpful but the sky seems darker than one might assume because of the elevation and lack of humidity. Tucson and Pima Co. AZ have a reputation for dark skies but still show up with a bright spot on the map...about the same as Albuquerque. I went out to the Petroglyphs/Volcanoes parking lot one night looking to see the most recent comet in the western sky -- there was a couple dozen people there doing the same thing when I got there. I enjoy the Perseid meteor shower from my back yard but I'm 15 miles out from the city center. Of course those same high and dry conditions work against you with a full moon.
Placitas is a good place to look at the stars. It's a town that has no stop lights or street lights because the of the residents' desire to get a good look at the night sky. There's even a star gazing club there.
The map is helpful but the sky seems darker than one might assume because of the elevation and lack of humidity. Tucson and Pima Co. AZ have a reputation for dark skies but still show up with a bright spot on the map...about the same as Albuquerque. I went out to the Petroglyphs/Volcanoes parking lot one night looking to see the most recent comet in the western sky -- there was a couple dozen people there doing the same thing when I got there. I enjoy the Perseid meteor shower from my back yard but I'm 15 miles out from the city center. Of course those same high and dry conditions work against you with a full moon.
Yeah, that map is cool and useful but doesn't seem to account for topography. For example, Placitas is a very short hop from Albuquerque but (as another poster has pointed out) stays pretty dark because it has a 10,000-foot mountain range between it and the city lights. This is true for a lot of other parts of the state as well and the map doesn't seem to reflect that.
The skyglow from Albuquerque and Rio Rancho are enough to affect the night sky in Placitas. The map does show Placitas as several shades better for stargazing, but the effects of artificial light go much higher up into the atmosphere than the Sandias. The light is not traveling horizontally, it goes up and gets reflected back down.
The most vivid night sky I ever saw was on a camping trip north of Abiquiu. Completely astonishing to walk under a sky packed full of stars everywhere you looked, with the bright swath of the Milky Way, while hearing owls hooting. An otherworldly experience and totally unexpected.
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