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No worries, Petra. A nice, big scope like yours is, well, nice. And big. Lots of light gathering potential, great for faint DSOs, pretty much perfect for everything. Everyone needs a light bucket.
But a nice refractor is certainly more portable. And easy on your back. And it doesn't have to cool down, so it's great for quick peaks. When I'm at my club, and we're all looking at the sky trying to decide if it's is worthwhile setting up our respective scopes, and everyone else decides not to bother, I find that they all start looking at me. It's like this: a short tube refractor is astronomy's urban assault rifle. Even a couple of holes in the clouds mean you've still got a chance to get in, kill a couple of double stars, dismember a DSO, and still get out before it all goes to hell. (Your GOTO owners are automatically out of the running because they can't find any alignment stars. Your bazooka dob masters can't be bothered straining their backs for 15 minutes of observing.)
Supposedly a good apo with fine optics can crank up the magnification to a surprising extent (i.e. unlike binoculars). And the apo loyalists argue that the quality of the image is superior to that produced by reflectors. (Big topic; I won't buy into that.) Certainly there are no diffractions spikes. Stars look like stars (so they say). And the wide fields are truly amazing. And you can use it during the day. And yes, it's good for astrophotography.
But I'm still glad I have a dob.
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