Hey guys.
I'm back! What a great time at the camp, unfortunately the weather only co-operated on the monday night, which is a shame for those that left on Monday.
But Monday night viewing was a blast! The seeing started out shocking, but after midnight it improved out of sight, and I got the best eyeball views of Mars i've
ever seen. So much detail visible.
With the family staying in Ballarat, I didn't do any allnighters but had a good time chatting and gossiping with the guys and girls there on Friday and Sunday night.
Many thanks to Ken and John for their incredible effort organising and setting up the camp - it ran extremely smoothly from what I could see, and it's a tribute to their organisation.
Many thanks to the generous guys and girls who helped raise the money to put towards IceInSpace. It's very very much appreciated.
Many thanks to the sponsors, Bintel, MyAstroShop, Australian Sky & Telescope and SkyLAB: Astronomy Software for supporting the camp.
Many thanks to Dave47Tuc, who let me spend most of Monday night by his side at his scope, with me bossing him around about what to view next.
And I agree with Geoff, every time I use ArgoNavis it goes higher up in priority in my "next buy" list. We had a great time viewing some faint and not so faint galaxies, hunting 12th Mag galaxies in Eridanus , looking at planetaries and of course spending a lot of time on Mars.
It was great to meet many IceInSpace members, and to hear how well everyone got on at the camp.. Many new friends were made and that's what it's all about.
Highlights of my Monday night viewing include Andromeda (M31 and M32 companion) in Geoff's 15x70 binos and Dave and Geoff's 10" dobs with a 31mm Nagler!
and M33 as well. It was my first ever view of Andromeda, and I can see why those Northerners get so excited about it. It's truly stunning and the dust lanes were quite visible even though it was only 10-15 degrees above the horizon.
Other highlights are Mars of course, incredible view in moments of good seeing. The Fornax and Grus galaxy clusters in the 31mm Nagler and many other targets, just great views throug Dave's 10" dob.
It was great to meet Bird (Anthony) and speak to him about imaging, and see him at work with Mars on Monday night. He's got a truly fantastic setup and it's made me start to think about a cooling system for my mirror. What I was previously blaming on poor seeing could well be put down to mirror temperature and tube currents. It was obvious from Bird's demonstrations when the mirror was not cooled how important it is to good images.
Everyone was very willing to share their knowledge and experience all through the camp. It was a great time and thanks again to Ken and John for an awesome effort.
I've got some pics from the camp, like everyone else, and will post them once I go through the 400-odd shots I have from the holiday
)
