Dark skies are an outdoors treasure

Amazing night sky in the village of Gornaya Mayevka in the Tian Shan mountains, some 30km from Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. — AFP via Getty Images/TNS

With each passing year, a Minnesota outdoors phenomenon on the fringe comes further into the light: the state's dark skies.

Last week they were feted with a virtual "Star Party" for the public through the University of Minnesota's Bell Museum in the United States. Astrophysicists, light pollution experts, Nasa ambassadors, photographers and even public lands managers turned the attention skyward, and for good reason.