Dark Skies

It’s a truly awesome experience to gaze into an infinite space studded with moons and planets, stars and galaxies. But often it’s not dark enough to see much. Light pollution in towns and cities robs the night skies of their clarity.

In recent years, stargazing – once the preserve of astronomers and fans of the BBC TV’s long-running Sky at Night – has spread in popularity. But you need Dark Skies to do it properly.

That’s where we come in. Wales, a largely rural country with few large concentrations of population, is amongst the darkest places in Southern Britain with ideal conditions for space explorers. Its skies – to borrow a description from Dylan Thomas’s Under Milk Wood – can be the perfect ‘Bible black’.

That’s certainly the case in Conwy County. On a cloudless night up in our hills and mountains an all-enveloping darkness provides an inky canvas for spectacular celestial light shows. It’s something you can appreciate almost anywhere. Here are a few of our favourite locations.

Llyn Geirionydd and Llyn Crafnant

This pair of forest-ringed lakes, sitting high above Trefriw in the Conwy Valley, are accessible by narrow minor road. The drive is worth it for the utter peace and outstanding night skies.

Penmachno and beyond

Take the road south from the village of Penmachno and keep on going. It climbs up a steep pass to open moorland above Ffestiniog. Its skies – big enough in the daylight – seem even bigger at night.

Tŷ Cipar

This remote former gamekeeper’s house is located in the same general area as the previous entry. It’s high on the Migneint, the boggy moorland, on the B4407 about 4½ miles south-west of Ysbyty Ifan and 5½ miles north-east of Ffestiniog.

Mynydd Hiraethog

Get yourself up to moody, empty Mynydd Hiraethog (anywhere near the Llyn Brenig reservoir will do) on a dark night and you’ll be seeing stars.

Tips for space explorers

You don’t need any specialised, expensive equipment. Often, the naked eye or binoculars will do.

Looking south depending on the seasons you can see Orion the Hunter, Gemini, Sirius, the Pleiades or Seven Sisters, the Summer Triangle, Cygnus, the square of Pegasus and the Milky Way (our own galaxy).

Looking north, the stars here are the same all year round, so can easily be found on a clear night. The group of stars known as the Plough are especially easy to recognise. The others are Cassiopeia and, of course, the North Star (or Polaris).