Drive: 311km
Walk: 7.4 km
We left Mudgee at 8:10am after a simple breakfast of porridge (Greg) and
weetbix (Wendy). Mornos was had in a
rest area in Mendooran; it was quiet and a nice spot to free camp if we are
ever in this area again.
We arrived in Narrabri just after 12:30pm after an uneventful trip. The road was mostly excellent with some parts
being a little rough, but nothing we could not handle. We checked into the Showgrounds on an
"honesty system" - $18 for a powered site for a night - not bad. After setting up, we had the usual lunch,
then a snooze.
It was very windy, and after a not so peaceful snooze (the wind shook
the van and the awning) we walked into town.
The walk was a bit further than we anticipated, however, it did stretch
the legs.
Went to the Australian Telescope Compact Array about 25 km West of
Narrabri. We arrived 7pm so the visitor
centre had no lights on, but was open.
We did get to see 5 telescope dishes.
The telescope is an array of six identical 22-metre diameter dishes,
which commonly operate in aperture synthesis mode to collect radio waves
from space and convert them to electrical signals. Five of the dishes can be
moved along a three-kilometre railway track. The sixth antenna is situated
three kilometres west of the end of the main track. Each dish weighs about 270
tonnes. The Compact Array is a part of the Australia Telescope National Facility network of radio telescopes. The array is
frequently operated together with other CSIRO telescopes, the 64-metre dish at
the Parkes Observatory and a single 22-metre dish
at Mopra (near Coonabarabran), to form a very long
baseline interferometry array.
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