Mazda 6 - Space To Call Your Own

Words by Scott Newman. Images by Nathan Jacobs

The room glows red like the interior of a submarine. Overhead a giant gap in the roof provides a vista of the night sky, the stars bright, twinkling pinpricks of light dotted apparently at random among a blackness so deep it seems impenetrable. Except tonight, we have access.

The Mount Burnett Observatory is located on the eastern outskirts of Melbourne, nestled between Cardinia Reservoir and the Bunyip State Park. Originally commissioned by Monash University as its main astronomical research site, today it is a not-for-profit run by a group of dedicated and passionate volunteers.

But our story starts earlier, with the sun high in the sky, conditions that are challenging for stargazing. Photographer Nathan and I have time to kill and a plan to kill it thanks to a Mazda6 Atenza Touring and the Dandenong Ranges between us and our destination. It’s the ideal photography car, with plenty of ‘space’ (sorry) for all Nathan’s gear.

We’re spoiled for choice thanks to the number of potential locations to visit in the thick rainforests that overlook Melbourne’s eastern suburbs. Olinda Falls is only a short detour off the main Mount Dandenong Tourist Road and is easily accessible for all ages.

Recent heavy rain should mean the falls are in fine form but a word to the wise, without appropriate footwear – ie not my slick-soled sneakers – the descent can be a heart-in-mouth affair. My tiptoeing at least provides amusement to a large flock of chuckling cockatoos. Despite lacking all-wheel drive, the Mazda6 has no such tractive difficulties on the slushy unsealed roads that lead back to the main road and our next stop.

Nathan has recommended Burke’s Lookout, but given the temperature feels to have halved since we last left the car – and it wasn’t high to begin with – and it has started to rain, I'm more inclined to head straight to a cafe for afternoon tea. Nathan wins. We trudge along a gravel path, dodging puddles, needle-sharp droplets of rain stinging our faces. This had better be good.

It is. Laid out before us is the entirety of Melbourne and despite the shower, the view is clear all the way to Port Philip Bay. It’s how Ed Harris’s character Christof, the director/mastermind of The Truman Show, must have felt overlooking the world he had created.

We could stand and look at the view all afternoon, but we have places to be and our extremities are turning pale blue. Once back at the 6, the heated seats are set to roast and the heated steering wheel slowly feeds life back into my fingers.

The Atenza Touring is completely at home on the twisting tarmac of the Dandenong Ranges. It’s not an overly sporting car – both Nathan and I agree the ride is superb – but the turbocharged Skyactiv-G engine has plenty of torque and the lovely steering and chassis balance mean it carves through corners. Perhaps the family wouldn’t appreciate such enthusiasm, but it does mean you can fit more sightseeing into a day!

We require fuel even if the car doesn’t, so a visit to the Emerald Village Bakery & Cafe is in order. There’s no sponsorship or partnership here, it just offers an extraordinary array of delicious produce. There are all the usual lunch options, but also giant homecooked meals for takeaway, pies and quiches and enough sweet treats to give Willy Wonka a stomach ache.

Suitably satiated, we still have a couple of hours before the sun will disappear so we head to Gembrook for some photography with the Puffing Billy railway station, the ultimate destination on its journey from Belgrave through Menzies Creek, Emerald and Cockatoo. But we’ve no time for train rides now.

The Mount Burnett Observatory (MBO) is only a short drive away on Paternoster Rd but it's not easy to find, even if you’re looking for it. On public open days there is obviously signage to point the way, but there is no hint of its existence from the road.

MBO President Anthony Ferriere is on hand to meet us and show us the facility, while Jacquie Milner will operate the telescope. The MBO’s origins are in the late-1960s when Monash University purchased a 40cm telescope (the dimension of the mirror, not the telescope itself) and, following its restoration, looked for a darker site to house it than the suburban university grounds.

Mount Burnett was identified as a suitable location and the two-storey dome in which we were standing in the opening paragraph of this piece was completed in 1972. It is an immense structure, the concrete foundations extending three metres underground. It was joined by the log cabin in 1975 and the facility began operations in February 1976.

The original telescope’s cost was well into seven figures, even in the late-’60s, but it was replaced by a 45cm-mirror telescope in 1985. It measures seven metres long and sits on a one-tonne mount (yes, really). This, in turn, sits on a decentralised pier to isolate it from any vibrations in the rest of the building.

There is much more to the facility than the main telescope, though. Smaller telescopes are mounted in another dome and the catchily titled ‘Chook Shed’ and there’s lightning detectors, a weather station, an all-sky camera to constantly monitor the Milky Way, seismic detectors and a JOVE receiver to study Jupiter.

For almost three decades it was home to nocturnal researchers – staff and students – producing endless observations. The site was closed in 2004 as most research work had moved to more modern equipment in NSW and in 2011 Monash offered the site to the Astronomical Society of Victoria but it declined, putting the MBO in danger of being dismantled.

Thankfully, a number of senior members of the society put up their own money to renew the lease agreement on the site and ensure its future. These days MBO holds public nights as well as community sessions and private viewings for small groups like us, with all funds used to maintain the site.

Ferriere patiently answers my many questions that even a fourth-grader would find a bit elementary. In layman’s terms, the large telescope’s primary role is to take very accurate measurements of a star’s brightness and colour and by monitoring the way these change over time, important information about a star’s size, temperature and rotation rate can be extrapolated.

There’s a lot more to it than this. In ways I don’t understand, by studying the colours in a star astronomers can ascertain its material make up. The smaller telescope is used for satellite and meteor tracking, information that’s useful to a great many people.

It’s tremendously exciting climbing the narrow ladder to the mezzanine. The dome is flooded in rich red light, which is used for scientific purposes but does fine double duty in creating atmosphere.

We are beyond lucky as tonight there is – quite literally – not a cloud in the sky. Jacquie has aimed the telescope directly at the moon that’s shining bright above our heads, but putting your eye to the viewer is breathtaking.

It’s almost 400,000km away yet every line, ridge, crater and colour is as crisp as those in the palm of your hand. It’s incredibly humbling and I find it almost impossible to take my eye away – what if I see something move? Nathan and I giggle at each other like overexcited kids on a school excursion.

Further treats are in store. Jacquie realigns the telescope and clearly visible, if only around the size of a Malteser, is Saturn. Pardon the pun, but the astronomical nature of this sight and the numbers involved are almost impossible to comprehend.

While it currently looks like a small marble, Saturn is nine times the diameter of the earth and the rings surrounding it are almost 300,000km across, nearly the distance between Earth and our moon.

It is on average more than 1.4 billion kilometres from Earth and as such, we are effectively looking into the past, with light from Saturn taking about 80 minutes to reach our eyes. It’s a wild and sobering thought that Saturn could disappear and we wouldn’t know about it until we were home and in bed.

Reluctantly, Nathan and I drag ourselves away to complete photography and by now it’s very late. In the valley below we see the broad spread of Cranbourne and Pakenham and it’s the light pollution from Melbourne’s inexorable urban sprawl that’s the biggest threat to the MBO’s activities.

According to Ferriere, complaining that your local streetlight is keeping you away will make a big difference, forcing councils to recess the lights and install hoods. That said, nature plays its own tricks, with moonlight reflecting off Port Philip Bay on clear nights also doing MBO and its observers no favours.

It’s been an incredible privilege to witness what we have this evening; it’s been the icing on a delicious cake of a day. If you’re at all interested in space, put an outing to the Mount Burnett Observatory on your to-do list. As Nathan and I drive home, the night sky, visible through the Atenza’s sunroof, no longer seems so impenetrable.