Light and Glory over Crete
Image Credit & Copyright:
Tomáš Slovinský
The month was July, the place was the
Greek island of
Crete, and the sky was spectacular.
Of course there were the usual stars like
Polaris,
Vega, and
Antares -- and that common
asterism
everyone knows: the
Big Dipper.
But this sky was just getting started.
The band of the
Milky Way Galaxy
stunned as it arched across the night like a
bridge made of
stars and
dust
but dotted with red nebula like candy.
The planets
Saturn and Jupiter were so bright you wanted
to stop people on the beach and point them out.
The air glowed like a
rainbow -- but what really grabbed the glory was a comet.
Just above the northern horizon,
Comet NEOWISE spread its
tails like nothing you had ever seen before or might ever see again.
Staring in amazement, there was only one thing to do: take a
picture.