Road to Astronomers

The southern sky and the Milky Way is photographed in the morning twilight above a road approaching the European Southern Observatory (ESO) site of Cerro Paranal, in the Atacama Desert, Chile. At 2,635 meters (8,645 ft) from sea level, with its dark and transparent sky, Paranal is home to some of the world’s leading telescopes. On top is the Very Large Telescope (VLT); composed of four 8-metre telescopes.