e-EyE were kind enough to work with us to design a large multi pier observatory with a host of individual features.
We spoke about it for some time before deciding that this was the best way to go. Now its complete we cannot believe we even considered not having all our equipment under one roof beforehand. It has enabled us to fit out the room in a way that would not have been possible without our own building, not to mention we only have one roof rather than 12 to deal with.
Insulated roof & walls
Deep insulated concrete floor slab that is very temperature stable
Dehumidified (In winter)
State of the art infrastructure with onsite backup from e-EyE
100Mb Synchronous Fibre Optic internet connection
UPS back up to all telescopes as well as critical systems
Dual weather monitoring systems
All sky camera
SQM Monitor
Coming soon - Seeing Monitor
Internal & External camera monitoring system
Autonomous roof that opens at dusk and closes just before dawn - Adverse weather events aside
Low walls to take advantage of our superb horizons
Monitored security system in a fenced & gated compound
As we are all based in Europe then the obvious choice for our first observatory was Spain as it allowed us a choice of driving or flying depending upon what equipment we need to bring & install.
There are quite a few companies offer similar facilities these days but the obvious choice for us was e-EyE as they offer best combination of robust infrastructure and clear dark skies.
There are some places in Europe with a few more clear nights and slightly better seeing but not many, what most lack however is the robust infrastructure and onsite technical know how to keep a project like ours looking up at the sky collecting data rather than fighting little issues that keep the roof closed!
560 meters above sea level
Clear skies and dry climate with seasonal rainfall periods, normally late Autumn and Spring
Skies that hover around 21.5 SQM, peaking at 22 SQM on occasions
Seeing is 1-2 on average
Long nights and dark skies even during mid summer thanks to our lower latitude
We recommend all of our users to download Telescopius to check what objects are in the sky. Alternatively, put our location into your chosen planetarium software on your PC
Our location: Latitude: 38° 13' 10.89" North Longitude: 6° 37' 54.32" West Altitude: 535 metres Timezone: Western Europe
Meet our hosts
Entre Encinas y Estrellas (e-EyE)
e-EyE are one of the world's largest hosting companies for good reason, the whole team are passionate about astronomy on a personal level and it really shows in how they run their business and care for customers needs as well as the level of service that they provide. We are proud to host with Jose and Cristina at e-EyE as are many others.
The e-EyE complex is meticulously thought through and growing rapidly with astro tourism being the next growth sector for them. We have enjoyed staying in the purpose made chalets when we have had to perform maintenance and look forward to trying the new apartments out when they become available.
For those like us who live in poor sky areas, e-EyE also run astronomy based holidays and tourism where you get to enjoy the glorious clear skies that this part of Spain provides, The astronomy courses are generally run by Jose Manuel who is one of the three “Jose’s” at e-EyE. He is very helpful, patient, knowledgeable and above all else enthusiastic - which gives him an ever present smile.
If you get chance book a trip to e-EyE and see for yourself, you may fall in love with the Extremadura region like we have.
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