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G'day Iain,
Whilst the pursuit of dark or darker skies is desirable and even necessary, it has been a disappointing exercise for me in the 15 month since Deb bought me the Meade LX 90 8" ACF.
In spite of many events at Bretti and the local Pony Club, cloud, work or domestic events has permitted me to get to only one.
The same situation at home in that it takes near 30 minutes to setup the LX90, so only Friday and Sat nights without clouds has been an option.
My fix, I just bought a Bintel 10" Dob. It is 2 minutes to fire up in the beer garden and 2 minutes to pack away.
It has been out on 2 nights and then 2 mornings in the last 5 days at 4:30am to view the amazing planet display before sunup and off I go to work.
I have also downloaded SkySafari Pro 5 for the iPad which is an amazing tool for planning viewing and then finding the subjects.
In short, when all the ticks line up I am off to dark skies with both scopes.
In the meantime, I am finally enjoying this hobby from my backyard because it is spontaneous, easy and dead set enjoyable in spite of the light dome around me.
Be encouraged.
Steve
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