My visit to European Northern Observatory (ENO)
DEL ROQUE DE LOS MUCHACHOS - La Palma
july 2005

On the rim of the Caldera de Taburiente National Parque, in the municipality of Garafía, 2,400 metres above mean sea level, is to be found one of the largest assemblies of telescopes in the world.
At present, there are telescopes and other intrumentation belonging to over 60 institutions from 19 countries at the Teide Observatory (Tenerife) and the Roque de los Muchachos Observatory(La Palma). This observational group, with the scientific and technical facilities provided by the IAC at its headquarters Instituto de Astrofísica  in La Laguna (Tenerife) and in combination with the planned Common Centre for Astrophysics on La Palma , jointly constitute the "European Northern Observatory " (ENO).

The Telescopio Nazionale Galileo (TNG), with a primary mirror of 3.58m, is the national facility of the Italian astronomical community

The Nordic Optical Telescope with 256cm primary mirror

The Gran Telescopio CANARIAS , is a high performance segmented 10.4 meter telescope to be installed in one of the best sites  of the Northern Hemisphere.
First light is planed for 2005.

SuperWASP is the UK's leading extra-solar planet detection program comprising of a consortium of eight academic institutions which include Cambridge University, the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias, the Isaac Newton Group of telescopes, Keele University, Leicester University, the Open University, Queen's University Belfast and St. Andrews University.

The LIverpool Telescope is a fully robotic operated telescope and is near the Mercatortelescope of Belgium

Building of the Belgian Mercator Telescope (1.2m)

Me and my youngest doughter and the1.2m Belgian Mercator Telescope

From left to right: The Liverpool robotic telescope - The Belgian Mercator Telescope - The Isaac Newton 2.5m telescope

seeing monitor

Me and my youngest doughter on the top of La Palma 'Roque de Los Muchachos on 2426 m altitude.  You have a great view over the island La Palma an e view of the observatories.

photographs - copyright 2005 - Erik Bryssinck