Quote:
Originally Posted by glenc
A belated welcome to Oz Lance.
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Thank you, my wife and i love OZ! The people, the land, the wildlife and last but not least the SKY!
We flew into Sydney around the 27th of Feb. only to be greeted by Thunderstorms that droped enough rain to rivial Hilo
. You can imagine how scary that was! We did a wet 2 day tour of Sydney harbor, the Blue ridge mountains, Featherdale park and Observatory.
Then after a 7 hr train ride and 1 1/2 hour car drive we made it to DRY Coonabarabran and Siding Springs!
Out of the 10 nights, 9 1/2 were totaly clear!
Heres what i liked about the sky from Coona:
1. Zodiacal light in the west
2. Gegenschein light in the east
3. Centaurs A galaxy Naked eye
4. 7.3 mag stars at zenith
5. No light domes
6. No twinkling stars above 20 deg.
7. Dark Neb, darker than sky
8. No air traffic over Siding Springs
9. 100% outdoor lights off at 11:00pm
10.Strict lighting codes & enforcement
And last but not least the Milky Way
is SO BRIGHT that it can cast a faint
shadow on a piece of white paper! YES
the Milky Way took my breath away. At
4am Sag-Sco was at the zenith, the halo
added 30% to the centers width as seen
from a typical dark site!
JAW DROPPING!
One of the best views was the
The inner Homunculus Nebula 
....through Andrew Merrell's 25 inch with a 31 Ethos ep!
You could eaisly see 2 dark lanes in the brightest lobe!
http://www.gemini.edu/index.php?opti...sk=view&id=180
Aloha, Lance aka "abellhunter"
http://www.anzaobservatory.com
...is Moving to the Southern Hemisphere any ideas, suggestions or
comments?
humphreys@greencafe.com