Dark sky places in Ohio

Ohio’s dark skies are about telescopes and programmes rather than wilderness darkness, and the two certified places show it. Geauga Observatory Park is a certified Dark Sky Park at Bortle 5, and its case is the glass: the 25.5-inch Oberle telescope and the 36-inch Warner and Swasey telescope at Nassau Station, with public astronomy nights through the year. Fry Family Park is an Urban Night Sky Place at Bortle 4.5, where the shelter lights go off on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The other two places, Cuyahoga Valley at Bortle 7 and Hocking Hills, are parks where the bright stars and planets are the targets, and Hocking Hills runs its programmes from the John Glenn Astronomy Park.Geauga’s public astronomy nights run through the year, around the new moon, and that is the easiest way in. Hocking Hills is a June to August park, and Cuyahoga Valley runs May to October. If you want the Milky Way itself, Fry Family Park and Hocking Hills are the better bets; if you want to look through a big telescope, go to Geauga.