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Easiest portable telescope is an 80mm or 100mm short tube refractor, preferably with a red dot finder and 6X30 finder. You'll want them to be ED for looking at the planets, or get cheaper non ED ones and use something like the Baader refractor filter on the planets. Plus the lightest good mount you can find.
At 25X, a 100mm refractor will show you scores of galaxies in Virgo at a dark site without much difficulty. My experience is that after picking up a cheap non-ED Celestron 102mm Wideview Spotting Scope on Ebay and replacing its finder, I've more or less nearly stopped using my previously much loved 80mm ED refractor.
If you go for the 5" MAK, the power is higher and field of view narrower than in a short tube refractor, and you need a half decent mount to use it easily - which will increase weight. The views on the planets will be better, but you'd want one which takes 2" eyepieces for the low power views (which are often the best views).
Regards,
Renato
Last edited by Renato1; 08-05-2014 at 07:00 PM.
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