Astrophotography in Brazil: Dark Sky Sites and Where to Go

Brazil’s problem is the reverse of the Atacama’s. The sky is dark once you leave the cities, but the cities are very large, they sit along the coast where most people travel, and the weather is wetter. So the question is where to go, and when.

The answer to “when” is the dry months. The answer to “where” starts with one park in the state of Rio de Janeiro that DarkSky International has certified, and a mountain in Minas Gerais where the national astrophysics laboratory runs its observatory.

Desengano State Park, Rio de Janeiro

In December 2021 Desengano became the first International Dark Sky Park in Latin America and Brazil’s first International Dark Sky Place. The park covers about 224 square kilometres of Atlantic Forest in the Serra do Mar, and its average night sky reading is 21.75 magnitudes per square arcsecond, dark enough for a Milky Way full of structure.

The park’s listing says the sky is completely free of cloud from May to August. The best place to set up is the Morumbeca dos Marreiros sector, the only part of the park you can reach by car and the one with the best facilities. The park is open 24 hours, but anyone entering after 5pm signs a visitor responsibility form at the visitor centre. The local astronomy club, Clube de Astronomia Louis Cruls, runs an outdoor planetarium session in an open amphitheatre.

Suits: a weekend from Rio de Janeiro, and a first serious dark sky for anyone living in the southeast.

Santa Maria Madalena

The town at the park’s headquarters. In 2025 Pousada Verbicaro here became the first DarkSky Approved Lodging in Rio de Janeiro state, with guided stargazing run with a partner astronomy club. A bed under a protected sky means you can image until dawn and sleep, which a long drive home does not allow.

Suits: anyone combining Desengano with a few nights of comfort.

Pico dos Dias Observatory, Minas Gerais

The Laboratório Nacional de Astrofísica runs its observatory at 1,864 metres, between the towns of Brazópolis and Piranguçu in the south of Minas Gerais. It is a research site. Scheduled group visits run on weekdays, and an annual open day lets the public in by registration and draw.

It is worth knowing about for a different reason too: the professionals chose high ground in the south of Minas Gerais, and height above the haze is what the coast lacks.

Suits: visits planned well ahead, and imagers in São Paulo state looking for altitude.

Choosing the season

Plan around the dry months, which in the southeast fall in the southern winter. Desengano’s own listing names May to August. That is also the season when the centre of the Milky Way is high in the evening, so the best weather and the best target arrive together.

In the wet season, expect dew. A lens heater and a spare power bank matter more than an extra filter.

What to shoot from Brazil

From Brazilian latitudes the southern sky is all yours: the Magellanic Clouds, the Carina Nebula, Omega Centauri and the Coalsack beside the Southern Cross. The galactic core passes close to overhead in winter. Northern objects like Orion and the Pleiades are still easy, just upside down compared to European tutorials.

Processing what you bring home

Akastroid stacks, calibrates and finishes your frames on your own computer and uploads nothing. The free download processes three sessions and allows one export, enough to put a Desengano night through from start to finish. If you buy a licence later, PayPal works for paying from Brazil, with a PayPal account or a debit or credit card.

If you shot with a smart telescope, smart telescope image processing covers the Seestar and Dwarf folders, and why your nebula is red explains the colour you will see in the first stack from a dark site.