Arches became a certified International Dark Sky Park in 2019. On a moonless night, the Milky Way is bright enough to cast a faint glow on the sandstone. Most guests have never seen anything like it.
Start with three shapes
- The Summer Triangle: three bright stars almost overhead in summer.
- The Big Dipper, low in the north, pointing to Polaris.
- Scorpius, low in the south, with the red star Antares in its heart.
Protect your night vision
It takes about twenty minutes for your eyes to adapt fully, and a single white light undoes it. We hand out red headlamps and keep phones on red-screen mode.
Best time
New moon weeks from April to October. We schedule After Dark around them.
Twenty minutes of darkness, and the sky starts to show you everything.
