Dark skies

This particular National Park includes the southern tip of Kielder Forest, the entirely manmade area of forestry that surrounds Kielder Water, and it’s partly thanks to the forest that the area was granted International Dark Sky Park status in 2013, thanks to the lack of light pollution in the area.

The subject has been gaining momentum recently, but light pollution has a serious effect on wildlife, most especially that of migrating birds, and one only needs to take a flight at night, or look at any nighttime satellite imagery of the earth, to realise the shockingly high level of artificial light that is being created, particularly in Northern Europe.

Although the 103,000 hectares of Northumberland National Park make it the largest protected Dark Sky Park in Europe, it doesn’t have the darkest skies possible as, if measured using the Bortle Scale, which runs from 1 to 9 (1 being the darkest, 9 being the level of inner city skies), Northumberland measures 3 on the Scale, with Britain’s only parks rating 1 being the Isle of Coll in the Inner Hebrides, and Mata ki te Rangi in the Pitcairn Islands (although that’s little surprise given that they’re located in the remote southern Pacific).

That said, a level 3 dark sky is still an incredible sight on a clear night, really bringing home the amount of stars that are visible even with the naked eye when there is little in the way of light pollution. If you’ve never seen the Milky Way in all its glory, then Northumberland on a clear night is a very good start.