I tried out the new observing spot last night. It was not a difficult choice, as my yard was clouded out. The new spot has a different micro-climate and provided good views of Ara. However, further east was clouded out. East was where my house is located. However, after about an hour, clouds also arrived at this location and brought the evening to an end.
The new location is the carpark of the Barron Gorge hydro-electrical power station. I always knew this spot was dark, but the steep mountainous gorge blocks out about half the sky. I also figured that there would be an issue with seeing from such a location.
The seeing was terrible, but the darkness of the sky and lack of artificial lighting offset this for my tasks. Saturn looked blurred when viewed through my Orion 80mm triplett at 120x. However, the star clouds and the dark lanes in the Milky Way looked glorious at 20x.
Now that I am viewing just one constellation during my Grand-Tour Evenings, the lack of not being able to view the whole sky becomes a non-issue, providing I can see the constellation of my choice.
The location can be seen on:
https://www.google.com.au/maps/place...!4d145.6772404
(Please note that the address identified is just a nearby location, and is not my home or that of anybody that I know- just close the side picture to better view the Gorge.)
I did have some organisational problems with the site. I meant to bring a mount that could carry two scopes, but accidentally brought the wrong mount along, so I was not able to use by Vixen 140mm. I correctly thought that I would need a larger scope to see the galaxies. I also did not have my more detailed star charts with me and became a little lost because of this.
I used the Orion 80mm, F6 triplet with a 24mm Panoptic and 14mm Radian for these observations. The main stars of Ara were clearly visible, but then again, they are also visible from my backyard.
Objects of interest
NGC 6362 is a globular cluster ...
This appeared as a haze of stars that showed no concentration towards the center. I found it best at 20x.
NGC 6215 & NGC 6221 are a pair of galaxies in the one field of view.
I tried, but this was too faint for my 80mm. I will try again with a larger scope.
NGC 6193 is an open cluster ...
I saw 3 different open clusters in this area, so I needed better charts with me to help with the identification. I will try again
Brs13 is a double star with Mag 5.8 & 8.5. Separation is 8.3" (17h19; -46.38)
This was also confusing, so will try again.
h4949 is a showpiece double according to Haas in Double Stars for Small Telescopes. Its pair is mag 5.6 & 6.5 with a separation of 2.1". (17h26; -45.51)
I spent far too much time trying to find this one. It was not till I came home that I realised that I had the wrong coordinates.
The Main Stars
Alpha Arae is about 10 Solar Masses and 6000 times as brighter than Sol.
It was white in colour.
Beta Arae is transforming from a giant to a supergiant star.
It appeared light orange. I experience a real thrill in being able to look at some of these stars and to understand the background story of what is happening with the star. I found this one particularly thrilling.
Gamma Arae is akin to being a more distant Rigel. Both stars give of about 120,000 times the energy of our Sun.
White in hue.
Delta Arae has a physic like me, it has a pronounced bulge at the equator.
White like me, well mostly. There is a family rumour that 1/32 of me may be something else.
Epsilon Arae is actually two stars, E1 & E2.
The brighter star was light orange, the other was white.
Weather permitting, I will try again tonight to make further observations.
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