So what was the surprise?
Well it's now Monday and it's a public holiday. So I'm gonna do my tax and stuff that I don't need to go out for today.
Anyway, on Saturday I got up at 6 and left Northampton at 7. I got to my parents' house at 12 and went straight to Chris's house for the Grand Final. What a game that was! The Eagles were playing terribly. There were SO MANY times where Sydney were able to get the ball down the field with absolutely no interference at all. The Eagles weren't sticking to their players and were making it easy for them. After that last shot at goal that a Swan intercepted, right at the last minute, it was all over. If only that Swan hadn't got in the way!!! We would have won!! Never mind.
So after that, Chris and I went back to my house to get ready for the surprise. He still had no idea. We drove there and when we got off the Freeway at Vincent street he sort of had an idea. As we got near to the roundabout that goes there he said 'We're going to Siena's aren't we??' or something like that. I was like 'yep! good guess! but that's only part 1.' So we had a really nice dinner at Siena's before part 2. Except there were these about 19-20 year old Planet-Look-At-Me type girls at the table behind us celebrating one of their birthdays. they were a little tipsy I think and yelling out things at people on the street and swearing and stuff. We ignored.
On to part 2... we had about an hour to kill in between and I still hadn't told Chris what we were doing, he just knew it was far away. So we went for a drive around Mounts Bay Road and through Kings Park before heading off to the hills. We drove and drove and got right up high into the hills and followed this road which was lined with tall trees whose trunks began right at the very edge of the road. It was really pretty and I'd like to go back there during the day. We followed the road along until we got to.... the Perth Observatory! Surprise number 2. We were there for a 'Deep Sky Night' tour. They told us a bit about the machinery and stuff in the Observatory, then they took us out along this path through the bush (past a few kangaroos) to the telescopes, which are each set up inside a dome (to block the light pollution from the city and the weather). The guy who came to Northampton and did the telescopes a few weeks ago was there. He didn't recognise me but I told him I was there and he was happy to hear that.
So we looked through 3 different telescopes of different sizes to see Alpha Centaurii (the top pointer star that leads to the Southern Cross) which is actually 3 stars that sort of rotate around each other but to the naked eye it looks like one bright star. We saw the Lagoon Nebula and the Swan Nebula. Nebulae are large gatherings of dust and gas and the way they are made determines whicih colour they appear. They make some of the most spectacular pictures, they were beautiful. We also saw the Magellanic Clouds, which to the naked eye look like two blobs of cloud, but through the telescope you can see are actually clusters of millions of stars in one bunch. They are 2 'companion galaxies' to our Milky Way galaxy and they are being drawn into our galaxy (but don't worry we wont be alive when they crash!). Absolutely amazing sight. The other one we saw was the Tarantuala Nebula which really does look like a tarantuala but it's really pretty.
It was very cold up there in the hills at night (the tour started at 9pm). I think it was about 8 degrees or less. We were all standing around freezing. It lasted about 2.5 hours. The last thing we did was walk up lots of steps to the biggest dome to see the biggest telescope. It is 24 inches in diameter and huge. I didn't want to stand underneath it in case it fell down and crushed me. There are computers hooked up to it that tell it what to do and which way to point and what to search for and stuff. The computers can even detect when there are clouds and close the roof of the dome so the rain doesn't get in (which would be a disaster) and they stay closed for 20 minutes after the cloud has gone. Pretty high tech! We could see Mars also from the balcony of the top dome. It was orangey-red and was just rising behind the trees. In October Mars will be as close to the Earth as its orbital path will allow. So that'll be cool to look at.
Anyway, by the time we finished I was so tired (I'd been up all day! from 6am to 11:30pm it was by then) that I was having trouble concentrating for the hour-long trip home. I just crashed afterwards. But it was worth it cause Chris enjoyed it and was very surprised :D
*phew* If you've read through all that, I congratulate you!