Thanks Doug, that was an enjoyable report.
Saturday night was a good night to get out there - clear nights have been a rare beast in Melbourne, lately.
However, when I reached my sports ground observing location, the sports clubs seemed to think they had the right to be there with lights on and bbqs blazing - How dare they!
So I found an embankment to set up behind. They gave up and turned lights off around 11pm. I had been thinking about looking north, but found myself sunk too deep to make much of it - M13 was below my horizon. But at one stage, Vega was just visible between trees and above the embankment, so I turned the scope that way looking for the famous Epsilon Lyrae, the "double-double" for my first time. I think the fact that my scope saw mostly embankment and a smigeon of sky didn't help - I wasn't splitting each double. OK, another night.
I turned my attention back to overhead and concentrated on seeing the various targets in Sagittarius, many for the first time. Had a great time locating globular clusters and seeing what I could make of the Lagoon and Triffid Nebulae with my new NPB filter.
Then a bright light behind me coming through the trees - What now?, I exclaimed!, are they back! Oh, the Moon.
Spent the last half an hour before I had to pack up, experimenting with getting maximum magnification on the Moonscape (through pine trees - Duh!) but came up with a combination of barlow, extension tube and 6mm eyepiece that was giving huge magnification. Nothing startling with poorish seeing, low elevation and a row of pine trees in the way
but I spent some time looking at craters Theophilus and Madler.
Positively balmy at five or so degrees. Little moisture to contend with. And not a cloud in the sky - marvellous!
Eric
