a publication for
May 2022
VAL DE VIE ESTATE RESIDENTS
Look How They Shine For You Stars have helped humans navigate for thousands of
28 billion light years from Earth. To put this in
beauty of the night heavens, why not walk around the
years. They differentiate day from night, have inspired
perspective, a single light year can be re-calculated
Estate when the sky is at its darkest? Winter stargazing
poetry, nursery rhymes, songs and national anthems.
as roughly 9.5 billion km away. It is astonishing then
(May to August) in the Winelands is a highlight because
We ‘wish upon them’ and while their light may seem
that Earendel can be detected by the Hubble space
it is the best season for observing hosts of constellations
telescope as a tiny streak of light. Earendel, meaning
that are visible from our hemisphere during the clear, cold
“morning star” in Old English, is estimated to be at
months of the year. Stars and planets have fascinated
least 50 times the mass of the Sun and millions of
humans for millenniums, and Val de Vie Estate provides
times as bright.
an ideal setting where skies, minimally polluted by the
Closer to home and with the naked eye, star gazing is
brightness of city lights, allow nature’s nighttime theatre
a wonderful experience and to take in the extent and
to roll out the greatest show from Earth.
wonder at their splendour.