What a fantastic Solstice weekend!
Apart from some great food again (lamb and veggie soup, special fried rice and cake, red wine...and beeeeer
) essentially peeeeerfect astro conditions were delivered at Eagleview, both Fri and Sat nights, woohoo. Unlike the surrounding low lands that saw temps well below zero (-7C in south Canberra) it was Mild for this time of year and didn't go below zero on the mountain, with no dew, no frost, no wind, no clouds and good transparency and seeing, what more can you ask for under Bortel 2 skies (two separate Unihedron dark sky meters showed sky brightness readings up around 21.8). So, imaged all night Friday by myself and then visually observed all night Saturday with mates, for the longest night of the year, what a blast! Tried out my mates new pair of 100mm binos on a parallelogram mount, which gave incredible OMG
type wide field views of the Milky Way, SMC and LMC, we found things in them and then pointed the 18" Dob at them, to take closer looks, reminiscent of the Palomar Schmidt and 200" Hale partnership
So, punctuated by visits inside to the fire for warmth, sustenance and beverages, we observed from 6:30pm to 4:30 am Sat night, magic...so, although lacking some sleep now, it was a great weekend that made the most of the long Solstice night
...happy days!...err?.. or nights..
Mike