'There's husbandry in heaven. The candles are all out'. I love this Shakespeare quote about thrifty angels. But it's not the first thing you want to spring to mind on a Stargazing evening.
So, you guessed it, despite the skies in the run up to the event being so clear you might believe you could see to the very bottom of a Black Hole, there wasn't a star to be seen as we welcomed our visitors..
Things kicked off with a fascinating intro from one of the East Riding Astronomers, Tony Scaife, who told us a little about what we could expect to see should the sky clear.
Uranus and Neptune would be strutting their stuff. And there was the Milky Way to look out for and its sister galaxy Andromeda. We might also see the Bode's nebula, a spiral galaxy like our own. The wonderfully named Blue Snowball nebula, with a blue-ish dwarf star at its heart, would also be on show. Shining bright too would be Mizar and Alcor in the constellation of Ursa Major - they're two stars in the handle of The Plough which despite its name, looks like a pan. Tony's list seemed seemed as infinite as the universe itself.
It was a lot to take in. So while we pondered the trillions of things floating above our heads - in addition to stars and planets there's also a mountain of 'space junk' like spanners and astronaut's gloves - it was time for a cuppa. (Thank you Barbara).
In the short while it took to brew up, the clouds dispersed so we headed out onto the reserve It takes around 20 minutes or so for your eyes to acclimatise to the dark. We kept safety lighting to the minimum and each torch was carefully wrapped in red cellophane to deaden its beam. The result was it was as black as pitch out there which added to the excitement.
Eight scopes were set up and, with the help of the East Riding Astronomers team, we saw all Tony promised and more, starting with The Seven Sisters. Representing the seven daughters of Atlas, the Pleiades, to give them their posh name, glowed in the far reaches of space looking much younger than their 75 -150 million years.
Popular with our younger visitors was ET. This is a cluster of stars resembling Spielberg's extra-terrestial. Seeing it up close through a lens, left everyone as wide-eyed as the cute little alien itself.
'We're all made from stardust', said Tony. It's a lovely thought. Could my DNA have a few grains from stars in the constallation of Cassiopeia, named after an Ethiopian warrior queen? Some of the other names, known as asterisms, weren't quite so appealling. Who'd want to hail from 'The Coathanger', for example.
Stargazing can be hungry work - not to mention chilly. Enter our very own souper-troopers, Sara and Dawn. Steaming cups of Carrot and Coriander or Pea n Mint soup were much needed after an hour on the cliff tops.
The patio behind the seabird centre was the perfect place to discuss the mysteries of the universe. Just how many football pitches could you fit between the Earth and the Sun, a distance of approx 93,000,000 miles. And what exactly were the Romans doing when the light from the star Betelgeuse first set off towards Earth (it's taken 1600 years to get here). Some questions just don't have answers.
Of our 30 or so enthusiastic visitors, Lucy and her Dad deserve a special mention. They had plenty of time to contemplate what they'd seen and discovered on their way home as they'd driven over specially from West Yorkshire, a 140 mile round trip. Was it worth it? Definitely was the reply. Which is good to know as we plan to do it all again some time in January.