Hi All,
Last night was a most successful night and morning. It’s hard to say how many people came along. But between IIS members and MPAS members I would say around 40 people where in attendance. The observing field was very full of scopes. Pictures below don’t show the full amount of scopes. As at least 6 more arrived after dark. All range of scopes where on show. From the MPAS’s 18” Newt and Greg’s 22” down to small 70mm Refractors. Six 10” Newts. A few 12” Newts. A couple of LX 200. A couple of home made scopes, which was great to see. Oh and Terry who decided to bring his scope but not set it up.
It was funny to see Terry meet IIS people for the first time in the flesh. Oh your Geoff and geez your Steve!! Yeh I know you Dave! Other IIS people to catch up with Christian,
Andy, Martian, Daniel, Darren, Robert, and many more (yeh I forgot who!)
MPAS members on site President Peter, also Kevin, Greg, Bob, Alios, John, Marty,
Good to see Julian and Mark, so many more it was a great turn out.
Now I couldn’t begin to tell you how many objects we observed. But the big ones where a hit. Saturn, the comet, Jupiter. 47tuc, Omega Cen, 5128 and M104. The list goes on and on. I observed 20 members of the Virgo Cluster and had what I thought was my best Jupiter view for a long time. I was able to use my 4 mm Radian. Most thought the view with a light green filter was great. GRS and many cloud bands on Jupiter viewed.
All scopes showed objects well. The seeing was very good.
There are many stories of the night, I hope others may say some. But one that stood out was I had Marty come over at around midnight. I gave him a run down on how to use the Argo Navis. After that I sat back and just called out NGC, Messier objects for him to observe. I think he observed 30 odd objects many for the first time. He just loved how the AN worked and it never missed an object all night. I think the thrill as always for me was showing people objects they had never seen before.
All scopes on site where fantastic as they where being used. As for the Skywatcher V GSO Dob battle the winner was!! A draw of course as everyone enjoyed the viewing.
Many people stayed on as I gave a who will be here to dawn!! Did not quite make it. But the night wrapped up by 5.30Am this morning. I have had 2 hours sleep, and I think many maybe in the same boat. It was worth it as it was a very successful night.
Thanks to the MPAS for the use of the site and thanks to all that came along.
Regards,
Dave.
.. will keep an eye out 1st thing next year tho, I've moved into an apartment so haven't had the scope out nearly as much as I'd like to.
