Hi Everyone!
I’ve just had a ‘practice run’ for tomorrow’s transit.....
According to several references - such as on page 63 of ‘Astronomy 2006 Australia’ by Dawes, Northfield and Wallace, the transit is on November 8th.
Hmmm. That’s Wednesday. I though it was on Thursday. I’d written Thursday down in my diary. So I checked the book - yep, it says ‘November 8’, so I made arrangements for someone to take care of my 2 yo daughter, got everything ready on Tuesday night and set the alarm for 6 am.
Now as I just got back to WA from Victoria, I’m still on EST time, so I woke up at 5 am. A bit of breaky, packed the car and went to a park with a high hill and a clear view. But it was cloudy.... I set up the two telescopes, and hoped it would clear, which it did after a bit of rain. By now it was 6:45 or so, and on my first look - hey! There’s a spot! Just near that sunspot. It’s smaller than I thought. A few quick photos.
Then the clouds came by again.
Half an hour later, it cleared again and another look. Hmmm, it doesn’t seem to have mooved much. Over the next half-hour, I kept looking. Yes, it seems to be slowly mooving - but at the same rate as the sunspots. Hey! What’s that? Another bit spot just disappearing over the limb? Maybe that’s it and I’ve missed it - but it looks the wrong shape - more photos. Hmmm, that’s a sunspot too.
So at 8 am, I packed up and went home.
Checking the date - on page 62 and 104 - it says 9th of November, but the 8th on page 63.
So...
We’ll now I am fully prepared for tomorrow’s event. I discovered that my T-mount has a loose screw and the camera wobbles. Also my PST is a bit wobbly on my small tripod and I should take the bigger one tomorrow.
Anyway, I assume that the bit that says the 8th is lifted from some US or European stuff where it still will be the 8th.
Did anyone else get caught too? (In my case, I blame it on the jet-lag - or maybe it’s jet-lead?
)
dunno they must of slipped into UT mode? whilst writing,
