13
© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
F. Sánchez, The Rise of Astrophysics in Modern Spain, Astronomers’ Universe,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-66426-8_2
2
Izaña (1961–1963)
In daytime under a bright sun Izaña and its occupants took on a quite different aspect and were no longer so frightening. The night of horrors had passed
and the beautiful light of a clear dawn chased away our nightmares. The fog
lifted to reveal a landscape that was impressive, lovely, sharply defined nearby
and limitless in the distance, with the snow-capped Teide above and the sea all
round. How different from the flat, open, and bounded horizons we were
used to contemplating in Extremadura and Castile!
In the absence of mist and nocturnal darkness, the Kaiser’s Lodge, our first
dwelling at Izaña Observatory, now looked pretty and bucolic from the outside (if you overlooked its peeling varnish and other signs of abandonment).
It must once have been a splendid colonial wooden bungalow. As a building,
it had its charms in spite of having suffered years of neglect and ill use. It was
first of all a hunting lodge in Germany’s African colonies, a gift from Wilhelm
II to one of his sons and heirs. The bungalow was later given to a team of
European scientists who came to Tenerife to observe Comet Halley in 1910.
It was set up in Cañada de la Grieta in Las Cañadas caldera. From there it
found its way to Izaña when Spanish meteorologists began their operations
there. Today it wears a coat of cement and forms the hub of a military outpost
for telecommunications.
Izaña Observatory, located on the summit of a mountain ridge of that
name, comprised a scattered group of large, ugly, poorly maintained buildings. It started life, however, as an ‘aereological observatory’, a base from
which to sound the troposphere with balloons and kites; it was then a thriving
research centre, well equipped and maintained, in which Spain’s first modern
meteorologists were trained. It was the cradle of Spanish meteorology and an
© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
F. Sánchez, The Rise of Astrophysics in Modern Spain, Astronomers’ Universe,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-66426-8_2
2
Izaña (1961–1963)
In daytime under a bright sun Izaña and its occupants took on a quite different aspect and were no longer so frightening. The night of horrors had passed
and the beautiful light of a clear dawn chased away our nightmares. The fog
lifted to reveal a landscape that was impressive, lovely, sharply defined nearby
and limitless in the distance, with the snow-capped Teide above and the sea all
round. How different from the flat, open, and bounded horizons we were
used to contemplating in Extremadura and Castile!
In the absence of mist and nocturnal darkness, the Kaiser’s Lodge, our first
dwelling at Izaña Observatory, now looked pretty and bucolic from the outside (if you overlooked its peeling varnish and other signs of abandonment).
It must once have been a splendid colonial wooden bungalow. As a building,
it had its charms in spite of having suffered years of neglect and ill use. It was
first of all a hunting lodge in Germany’s African colonies, a gift from Wilhelm
II to one of his sons and heirs. The bungalow was later given to a team of
European scientists who came to Tenerife to observe Comet Halley in 1910.
It was set up in Cañada de la Grieta in Las Cañadas caldera. From there it
found its way to Izaña when Spanish meteorologists began their operations
there. Today it wears a coat of cement and forms the hub of a military outpost
for telecommunications.
Izaña Observatory, located on the summit of a mountain ridge of that
name, comprised a scattered group of large, ugly, poorly maintained buildings. It started life, however, as an ‘aereological observatory’, a base from
which to sound the troposphere with balloons and kites; it was then a thriving
research centre, well equipped and maintained, in which Spain’s first modern
meteorologists were trained. It was the cradle of Spanish meteorology and an