Star sightings in Big Bear? Yes, with the right lens

The mountain community of Big Bear Lake will turn its attention from skis to the skies with a new StarLight Festival May 24 and 25.

The free event, designed with families in mind, will feature speakers from NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, live music, art, workshops, displays, demonstrations and plenty of stargazing (a meteor shower is expected). In addition, there will be tours of the Big Bear Solar Observatory, which is usually closed to the public.

The festival will run 10 a.m. to 11 p.m. on Saturday, May 24; and 10 a.m. to 11 p.m. on Sunday, May 25. Most events will take place at the Northwoods Resort & Conference Center, 40650 Village Drive, Big Bear Lake.

Speakers and panelists include Story Musgrave, who flew six space shuttle missions as an astronaut in the 1980s and ‘90s; and Seth Shostak, who is a senior astronomer at the SETI Institute (whose mission includes the search for extraterrestrial intelligence). Others on the schedule include Linda Spilker, a JPL scientist who has specialized in Saturn and its rings; and Andre Bormanis, science research director for “Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey.”

Besides the fledgling StarLight Festival, there’s also the RTMC Astronomy Expo running May 22-26 at YMCA Camp Oakes in Lake Williams, 11 miles east of Big Bear Village. The expo, which goes back 45 years, offers visitors a chance to look through a variety of telescopes and buy equipment at an expo swap meet.