What's at the end of a rainbow? Ever been to one?

Question

Don't say pots of gold coins okay!

Answer 1

Try a small activity:

Gather these items from your home or workplace:
a water glass
a flashlight, or other directed beam of light
a round-bottomed flask, or some spherical glass container (a round fishbowl would work)
a small piece of cardboard or posterboard that fits over the head of the flashlight
a 10"x14" piece of white posterboard

Place the glass filled with water near the edge of a table that is bathed in sunlight. As in the drawing below, a "rainbow", or spectrum, should appear on the floor near the glass. If the sun is low on the horizon, look for the spectrum on the wall!



What is the glass and water doing to the light? Visit the Rainbow Readings to find out...Return here when you are finished.

Let's repeat our experiment with the water and the light. This time we need to use the round container, the flashlight, and the small and large pieces of cardboard.

Cut a narrow slit in the small piece of card/poster board and tape the piece to the head of the flashlight, so that only a small beam of light emerges

Now cut a fist-sized hole in the middle of the large piece of posterboard. Also fill the spherical container with water.

Shine the narrow beam of light from the flashlight through the hole in the posterboard and onto the container. You may need an extra person to hold the container while you shine the light and hold the white posterboard.



What do you see on the container-side of the posterboard as you shine the narrow beam of light onto the water-filled flask? Can you position the flashlight and container so that you see a spectrum on the white paper?

What is the shape of the spectrum on the piece of posterboard? How is this similar to a rainbow in the outdoors? How is it different?

If you have access to a garden hose, a sprinkler, and a water spout, go outside and try to make your own rainbow!



Get a fine misting sprinkler and set the water pressure high enough to get a large volume of water droplets in the air.
Based on what we've learned up to now, where should you stand with respect to the water and the sun?
Find the shadow of yourself on the ground. Try to measure the angle from the shadow of your head to the rainbow arc. Use the "hand and fist" method to measure this angle: if you stretch out your arm and make a fist, the width of your fist is about ten degrees; the width of a finger at arm's length is about two degrees. Try it!

Answer 2

End Of A Rainbow

Answer 3

Yes loads of times in Ireland. You often see the full full rainbow going from the ground, up and over and back down to the ground on the other side. Sometimes you see a double rainbow that's full (a double rainbow is a large rainbow with a smaller on underneath it). And even better sometimes when the rainbow goes over the sea you see a reflection of the rainbow so that it looks like a full circle.

Answer 4

A rainbow exists because each tiny spherical drop of rain can bend light like a prism and you see a specific color from a particular drop depending upon the angle the drop makes between you and the sun. Each person actually sees a 'different' rainbow depending where they are standing. At the end of your very own rainbow are the last few drops of rain refracting sunlight to you, but of course you can't get there without destroying the angle that made your rainbow possible (the rainbow will always disappear ... with the pot of gold!).

Answer 5

A rainbow does not have an end because it's really a circle. The full circle of arc cannot be seen from the ground but may be observed from an airplane. The center of the circle is always at a point in the sky opposite the sun. The size of the visible portion of the rainbow depends on the altitude of the sun, being largest when the sun is at the horizon. Because the radius of a rainbow is 42 deg, it cannot be seen when the altitude of the sun is greater than 42 deg; no part of the rainbow would be above the horizon

Answer 6

Well I have never been to the end of a rainbow. But Blue (the cat) says he has. He says that not only is there gold, but there is blue and green and yellow. He says that he chased this rainbow all the way to Emerald City. Where he saw the big Oz. He was then chased by flying monkeys and came home.Now remember he is just a cat with a imagination. I think that you might want to just follow the rainbow yourself and see where it leads. Everyone finds something different. I never found the end of the rainbow cuz each time I started out I ran into something better to do. Good Luck and Happy New Year.

Answer 7

The Irish leprechaun's secret hiding place for his pot of gold is usually said to be at the end of the rainbow. This place is impossible to reach, because the rainbow is an optical effect which depends on the location of the viewer. When walking towards the end of a rainbow, it will move further away.

There's nothing at the end of the rainbow but we can all dream can we of a pot of gold and a leprechaun.

Answer 8

We climb over hill and dale, and each other, in pursuit of the riches at the end of our rainbows, but an end is never to be found---it's an illusive and elusive venture!

The riches of the rainbow were there (already) before we set out with our 'ambitious' designs, and hopes of pots of gold! It was the rainbow itself that was the prize! And, for some--- it is the endless gilded journey .

Answer 9

This Site Might Help You.

RE:
What's at the end of a rainbow? Ever been to one?
Don't say pots of gold coins okay!

Answer 10

The rest of the world .... rainbows are created by light reflecting on the droplets of water in clouds .... the cloud dissipates and the rainbow disappears .... leaving behind what was there all the time behind the cloud ..... it's a wonderful, optimistic and hopeful vision .... a moment when you change your path to the next and new stage in your life ....