This guide is about the Isaac Newton Group of Telescopes at the Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos on the island of La Palma. It describes the telescopes and instruments available, explains how to apply for observing time, how to communicate with and travel to the observatory, and shows what support you can expect before, during and after an observing run.
If you are preparing an application to observe on La Palma or if you have
already been allocated observing time, read this manual first. The telescopes
and instruments are described in Chapters 2--8. If you need further details
consult the user manual for the instrument you have in mind (see section
). For
up-to-date information and advice, consult the appropriate scientific or
technical specialist at Cambridge or La Palma. A list of contact people
(Telescope Managers, Instrument and Detector specialists) is kept up to
date on the ING information pages of the World-Wide Web. If you have any
trouble finding the right person or information you need, contact the La Palma
Support Group at Cambridge (see section
) whose staff will steer you in the right
direction.
Although this guide was up to date when published, more recent documentation
may be available --- see section
below for a guide to sources of up-to-date
information. The LaTeX source of this
Guide is available by anonymous ftp from the Cambridge Sun cluster
( ftp.ast.cam.ac.uk) in the directory
/pub/lpinfo/lpguide.
Any comments on this guide should be sent to the editors at the Royal Greenwich Observatory, Cambridge.