From the sculpted monkey fitted with a telescope on the facade, to the work room equipped with sextant, hypsometric boiler and bent theodolite brought back from Ethiopia, passing through the thoughts inscribed in Arabic, Basque and German on the walls, the castle- Abbadia Observatory, in Hendaye (Pyrénées-Atlantiques), retraces the passions of Antoine d'Abbadie, cartographer, explorer, linguist and astronomer of the 19th century.
No wonder the estate, bequeathed to the Academy of Sciences, regularly hosts conferences on exoplanets or observation sessions.
"It's obvious to come and observe the sky at the foot of the castle", slips Christian Marquestaut, of the Popular Astronomy Society of the Basque Coast, which will make telescopes, glasses and binoculars available to the public on Saturday August 13, at the occasion of the Night of the Stars.
Light pollution
Even if the observation conditions along the Basque coast are not ideal.
"The luminous halo created by the cities of Hendaye, Saint-Jean-de-Luz and Fontarrabie prevented observation, it was necessary to stop using the meridian telescope of the castle from 1975", explains Élie Castagnet, guide of the domain.
Before the arrival of light pollution, during its hundred years of use, the astrometric telescope - "and not astronomical" - had nevertheless made it possible to "position precisely 50,000 stars and to establish nautical almanacs, invaluable for navigation at the time and for the conquest of space today!
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