Diplomatic World 67

THE FUTURE IS IN THE STARS
IN THE BENTLEY CONTINENTAL GTC V8,
TRACKING DOWN URSA MAJOR –
THE GREAT BEAR
A SHORT DAY’S LONG JOURNEY
THROUGH THE NIGHT
There it is. The very first star of nightfall. A planet actually. Venus.
Lit up by the sun which is now leisurely slipping below the horizon,
unhurriedly. Its last remaining rays breaking up a few solitary
clouds. One by one they disappear until the darkening sky is
wiped clear. And the last lights of the scattered houses and cottages
begin to go out, too. We switch on the headlamps of the
Continental GTC and glide through the Alpine pasture landscape
at a measured pace.
It’s grown dark by now. Dark, but not sombre, because the many
twinkling stars appearing, coming out here, there and everywhere
to let the stream of the Milky Way emerge, are joined by the
shining moon. She washes over the white Conti with gentle white
light as it begins its journey across the nocturnal firmament. And
here, in the Star Park on the Winkelmoosalm mountain pasture
near Reit im Winkel in Bavaria, some 1,200 meters above sea
level, this firmament appears to stretch particularly far. Lined by
clear-cut silhouettes of the forests and mountains, where the air
is purer than pure.
One typically drives a convertible in the light of day, under the
bright sun in a warm season – at least in central Europe. England
doesn’t conform to this. The British island, from which our travelling
companion on this star journey hails, knows no fixed season
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