[Rob_K]

Just a little obs report from the Border Stargaze!

Time: 7pm-2:30am, Fri-Sat 29-30 August 2008 (UT+10)
Location: Wymah Valley Retreat, Bowna, NSW
Telescope: Tasco 4.5" f8 reflector on Alt-Az mount (+ several other scopes!!!)
EP: 21mm Celestron X-Cel (+ several other EPs on several other scopes!!!)
Transparency: Good – fair
Seeing: Fair

First off, my own gear:

Because I had people with me and there were throngs of people around wanting to look through a telescope (any telescope, apparently ), I went to some of the ‘biggies’. Gobular cluster Omega Centauri NGC5139 was great, a big sparkly coccoon against the black. 47 Tucanae NGC104 was another hit, showing well with its bright central condensation. The dark lanes, nebulosity and bright starfields of the Eta Carinae nebula NGC3372 were very obvious at low powers, and the Butterfly Cluster M6 in Scorpius looked beautiful. Nearby, Ptolemy’s Cluster M7 was just a bit too big to appreciate in the eyepiece, a much better binocular object. The Sculptor Galaxy, NGC253, was a big grey slash in the field and an easy thing for newcomers to see & appreciate. Jupiter was fantastic early one, with two bright moons very close together on each side. I also went to the Dumbbell Nebula M27, a bright, largish patch of grey with some structure evident.

Grabbing a few minutes of quiet, I swung the scope around to the Saturn Nebula, a planetary nebula in Aquarius that I hadn’t seen before. I was surprised at how bright it was – a pale bluish colour, quite tiny in the field, but staring at it revealed what seemed to me to be a ‘knottiness’. I was about to put the 9mm ep in for a closer look when I got ‘waylaid’ again and I never got back to it. Later, I did get a look at M57 the Ring Nebula, a tiny smoke-ring in Lyra, and M13 the Great Cluster in Hercules (globular). The latter was right down in the murk and barely visible – couldn’t resist the opportunity of telling people that this glob is the biggest & brightest visible in the NHem hehehe, not fair really under the conditions and especially after looking at 47 Tuc & OC!

Had a wander round too. Early on, Daniel (Dannat) who was set up next to me gave me a look at Jupiter through his new binocular eyepiece. Great stuff! Queued at the two 18" Obsessions as well. Jupiter was first – great colour and detail. The other Obsession had 3 small edge-on spiral galaxies in the field – great view, nice and bright, but I have no idea which ones they were.

At about this time, transparency went really off, and I cancelled my planned dim galaxy search. The skies came good again at about 1am, in time to see M31 Andromeda Galaxy low in the north. Always spectacular, but definitely better in my binoculars than my scope. Then I stupidly thought I might try to image it at 55mm in the 400D – by the time I’d stuffed around putting the EQ mount together, walking backwards and forwards to the car on the observing field five times to get bits of gear I needed, and rough polar aligning, the clouds were coming in again. The alignment was monstrously out so I gave up – would have been much better spending the hour or so observing!!!!

But all in all a fantastic night!!!

Cheers -