Sunset over the Arizona desert. This was taken from a road behind the 2.1-meter building where the instrument I used was housed.



The 4-meter building (largest building in middle) taken from in front of the 2.1-meter building. As a scale, I would appear as big as just one of those boulders you can see on the foot of the 4-meter.



A similar picture of the 4-meter taken from further away. The other domes are some of the smaller telescopes owned and operated by various Universities and projects (the dome located just to the left of the 4-meter is a telescdope owned by Harvard I believe, and the silver-dome telescope is a member of the "Spacewatch" network. It looks for asteroids that pass close to the Earth and could one day impact.



The McMath-Pierce Solar Telescope at sunset. Notice the road in front for scale. Solar telescopes are very different from "regular" telescopes, in particular because they need excellent cooling systems since the size of their beams of the Sun are so huge and intense it can damage the actual telescope if not controlled and cooled. Observers at this telescope are also the only one's who get to "work" 9-5, although engineers and volunteer staff for the public work during the day on the mountain.



The Coude feed telescope at sunset. I would have to climb up the stairs on the right of the image to reach the control panel for opening up the telescope. The grey box at the top of the stairs controls opening/closing the telescope. The telescope itself is approximately 1 meter (3.3 feet) in diameter and is housed inside the shed-like building on top (with the door). The shed-like building has a garage-door that opens up and the entire structure peels back towards the control box on a set of tracks to reveal the 1 meter telescope. The tall tower structure on the left of the image is also used by this telescope. The little door on top is opened up to reveal a small mirror. Light is reflected off the mirror from the 1-meter primary telescope towards this tower, that then automatically shifts to reflect the light BACK towards the 2.1-meter building, where it enters through a light tube (not visible but to the right of the shed) and then goes through the instruments that are inside the building itself.