I built my observatory at fellow astrophotographer John Whitby’s Star Field site, a 15 min drive from Martinborough – a village in the wine growing Wairarapa region towards the southern end of the North Island of New Zealand.  The site is around 75 km from Wellington from which it is separated by the Remutaka Range that serves to largely block out the city’s light dome to the west. To the east, there are no major settlements and to the south a large expanse of ocean. The sky conditions can be excellent – the air is clean, transparency is very good, light pollution is minimal and the skies class as Bortle 2 on the sky brightness scale. Seeing is usually around 1.5 to 2 arc sec, but can sometimes be as good as 1 arc sec, or rarely on those extra-special nights, sub arc second.

Over a year and a half, starting March 2020, I built a 3 x 3.4 metre roll-off roof observatory at Star Field with a permanent steel pier anchored into a cubic metre of concrete. The observatory is ‘off grid’, has solar power and a rural internet connection and is currently non-automated – I need to actually go to Star Field to make images, enjoy and connect with the night sky and usually camp out.

Below are a few images of the observatory build at various stages, arranged in a vaguely chronological order. Although it took me the best part of 1.5 years to complete (due to the COVID pandemic), as soon as the pier had been installed I was able to start using the observatory, first as a platform.

I’m hugely grateful to John for hosting me at Star Field, and all his patient help and advice throughout my building project and beyond.