Perseid Meteor Shower - Trona Pinnacles

A few of us went to Trona Pinnacles for the peak of the Perseid Meteor Shower after Allan sent a link to a PhotoPills page with details about the event. We had minimal camp equipment, plenty of water, numerous cameras (one with a new ultra-wide lens) and tripods, one smart phone, a couple of compasses, high hopes.

What a night!  I could barely close my eyes to nap.

With reasonably dark skies and the new moon rising on Thursday, at an elevation of about 1,800 to 1,900 feet, we had a great view of the broad heavens and saw lots of meteors streaking past us.
I made a lot of still images in the 13 to 20 second exposure range and caught about five meteors.  When I set up for a 12 minute star trails exposure at about 1:15am I caught one. Obviously, I was not looking in the right direction.

Allan set-up a time lapse camera and captured LOTS of meteors. His lens was open 15 of every 20 seconds. You can watch it on YouTube.  Be sure to go full screen to see all the meteors.

In the meantime, you can browse my little gallery of Trona photos. I was looking for "available" light (car headlights passing by, walkers with flashlights, the occasional flash from some distant photographer). I may not have captured meteors in pixels but I have many indelibly recorded in my brain and I had a marvelous night under the stars.

Next year, I'll be better prepared for the long meteor-catching exposure and choose my composition more carefully!  I'll also have a walking around camera and tripod to snag the opportune moment before a pinnacle.

Waiting for Perseus

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