Originally Posted by
tennislover9
OP did you have a chance to visit very large telescope whilst in the area? That has been a dream of mine to visit (star gazing in the desert at night).
It's a dream that you will not realize even if you become an astronomer. People no longer look through any large telescopes. Instead the beam is diverted to a specialized instrument designed for the specific type of experiment that the principal researcher on the telescope is working on at the time.
Six months ago I was fortunate enough to tour the inside of the dome of one of the 10 meter telescopes located at the top of Mauna Kea on the big island of Hawaii. There is simply no way to look through the telescope, even the people who maintain the equipment don't have a way.
Sorry!