A cache with some pretty good views. Located along a 4x4 trail in Park County
Makemake
(common US pronunciation: moc-KEE-moc-KEE)
The Solar System’s 12th discovered planet. Discovery made on March 31, 2005 by Mount Palomar team Mike Brown, Chad Trujillo and David Rabinowitz. Has no known satellites, making mass hard to determine. Probably the largest true Kuiper-Belt Object (KBO) discovered so far, roughly 2/3rds the size of Pluto.
Mike Brown had been holding back on making a proclamation for the discovery because they were also determining masses for Eris (formerly known as Planet X, or Xena) and Haumea, when a team in Spain also announced discovering Haumea, so with the cats out of the bag, so to speak, the declaration for Makemake was made on July 27, 2005.
Makemake is the only other Dwarf Planet besides Pluto bright enough that Clyde Tombaugh had a chance at seeing it: however, in the years Tombaugh was searching for planets, Makemake’s position would have visually set it among the stars of the Milky Way, so it is no wonder it went undiscovered so long.
Possibly in an 11:6 orbital resonance with Neptune, putting it in the same strange category as Pluto and Orcus as far as Trans Neptunian Objects go.
Originally I thought this science series would be a power trail, but things being the way things are, these astronomy-themed caches are not very power-trail-ish. Instead, the first half can be found along Lake George’s Forest Rd 271. This is a 4x4 trail; please do not attempt with a regular car! Terrain and difficulty ratings are for people who drive to the cache locations; if you hike or mountain bike, of course the D/Ts will be different.
There will be a mixture of regular sized and small caches to start. We have a lot of peanut-butter jars to repurpose. The key is to have fun! And stay safe!
cache is a short walk (less than a 10th of a mile) from Forest Road 271. Nice views!
..and its JHerber for the win! FTF on 08/27/13!
Makemake (Astronomy science series)
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