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Happening
at the Crossroads
May 18,
2009
by Coggin
Heeringa
We’ve
waited for months and finally… finally, it’s here! Spring and Memorial
Day weekend and at the Crossroads at Big Creek that means participating
in the Door County Festival of Nature.
Crossroads is proud to be
collaborating with The Ridges Sanctuary, The Clearing, The Nature
Conservancy, Door County Land Trust and the Wisconsin Department of
Natural Resources to present a a three-day event celebrating and
promoting the protection of the natural landscapes of our very special
peninsula.
According to the Festival mission statement, “This is
done through a variety of indoor and outdoor educational session on
wildflowers, birds and the important land and resource conservation
efforts taking place in Door County.”
The Collins Learning
Center is reserved this weekend for festival activities. Many trips and
lectures are filled, but some offerings are still open. Click for more
information about trip availability and for registration materials.
If
you are a member of Crossroads, or any of the sponsoring organizations,
you are eligible for reduced member rates. In conjunction with the
Festival, at 9 pm on Friday, May 22, the Door Peninsula Astronomical
Society invites the general public to join festival participants for a
free evening of Night Sky Viewing at the Leif Everson Observatory at
Crossroads. This will be a clear-sky-only event, but because it will be
a moonless night, viewing conditions should be excellent. Members of
the DPAS will have scopes set up in the StarGarden.
Saturn
In
May, most of the planets are visible in the pre-dawn hours, but Saturn
will be high in the southeast during the evening hours. This year, we
do not see much of the beautiful rings of Saturn because we are getting
the edge-on view from the Earth. To picture this, imagine looking at
someone exactly your height wearing a hat. You see very little of the
hat brim. You have an edge -on view. So last week, when I looked at
Saturn, the ringed planet looked rather like a yellow mellon ball with
a tooth pick through it. However surface features and shadows were
visible through a quality telescope.
We encourage people to
enjoy the wonders of the night sky, which due to light pollution, are
difficult to see in many parts of the world. Please use the Utah Street
entrance to Crossroads.
Friday and Saturday May 21 - 23
Door County Festival of Nature
Friday May 22, 9:00 PM
Viewing Night at the Observatory
The
community is invited to join Festival participants and members of the
Door Peninsula Astronomical Society to explore the wonders of the night
sky. Clear Skies ONLY. Please use the Utah Street Entrance to
Crossroads.
Sunday, May 23, 1:00
Nature Hike
Join the naturalist for a one hour tour of the preserve. A perfect way to celebrate spring. Meet at the Collins Learning Center.
Crossroads
at Big Creek is located at 2041 Michigan Street (County TT in Sturgeon
Bay. The Collins Learning Center is open 2 - 5 pm daily, but will be
closed on Memorial Day. Trails are open to the public.
Many of
the Past News articles may be retrieved from this directory,
indexed and named in the following manner: 080101-news.htm
where
the first two numbers are the year, the second two the month and the
last two the date.
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