07/31/2005 12:55am - 2:30am - Seattle backyard - XT10 - Recently there is an e-mail circulating the internet about how
next month Mars will be as close as it's ever been. Several of my family members have forwarded the e-mail to me. I had to
break the news, that yes, it's all true except the date. They are two years too late. Mars' orbit brought it closest to earth
in August of 2003 (read below for my journal entry). While it's pretty crummy for someone to put out a false e-mail like that,
it did remind me that I hadn't viewed Mars through my 10" dobsonian telescope yet! So tonight I made plans to observe it. I set up my scope outside to let it cool down while Kim and I watched Seabiscuit- what a great movie!
Afterwards I went outside to my nicely cooled telescope and spotted Mars just rising in the east over Bellevue.
It was still low on the horizon at 1am so the image was really swimming, so took at look at M32 and M110. The street lights were really
glaring so I moved the scope to the back yard and resumed observing Mars from there. As it rose in the sky, the viewing
improved but it never really was good. Since I had the scope out, I finished the evening by looking at the Ring Nebulae (M57) and the Dumbbell
Nebulae (M27). My new Orion DeepView 42mm eyepiece makes it really easy to spot things. It's like watching TV, it's so big!
07/23/2005 10:00 pm - Ocean City State Park, Ocean City, WA - ETX-90 - I brought the ETX-90 to my family's annual beach
trip to take advantage
of the dark skies. We got some decent views of Jupiter, M32, and the Double Cluster near Cassiopeia, but all the moisture in the air made
for a lot of swimming.
02/16/2005 6:25pm - 9:47pm - Seattle backyard - XT10 - Tonight it was clear and cold again so I brought the big Dob
out to the backyard. While the mirror was cooling down, I first turned the scope to the brilliant half moon. Even with my moon filter, it was incredibly bright.
I tried out different eyepieces to zoom in on interesting features then turned the scope to Saturn. I found my light blue filter
this week, so I was able to use it to discern more cloud bands on the planet itself. With the filter, the planet body on the whole
took on an orangish hue. Again I played around with different eyepieces. I brought out my TeleVue 2X barlow and my Televue 11mm Plossl
eyepiece and compared them to the Meade and Orion barlow and 10mm eyepice. While the rings seemed to be cleared, there was a
bright glare off the planet. Even later in the evening, when the TeleVues had cooled down, this glare was present. I wanted to view
something new, so I looked in my star charts and saw that M44 (Bee Hive Cluster or Praesepe) was close to Saturn, Castor and Pollux.
I didn't find it right away so I went inside and got my binoculars. One I star hopped from Pollux to M44 I then was able
to find it in my scope with little trouble. Wow! It is very similar to M45 (Pleiades) except the stars are smaller. Inspired
by this success I then looked for M35, M32, M110, M45, and finally M42. Wow! What a great evening!
01/04/2005 5:20am - 7:05am - Seattle sideyard - Inspired by last nights NOVA program on Mars, I went out this morning and did some observing with my big
telescope. I first viewed Jupiter and saw that one of it's moons, Ganymede, was about to dissappear behind
Jupiter as it revolved in its orbit. Then I viewed the Coma Bernices region where every point of light is
really a galaxy! By this time the beautiful crescent moon rose over our neighbors house so I finished my
morning up by sketching craters. Amazing.
12/20/2004 6:30pm - 8:45pm - Seattle frontyard/backyard - It was clear again, so I took the XT-10 outside again
and searched for the Machholz comet. Earlier I had looked up it's position from my Starry Night software and marked
the location in my Wil Tirion Star Atlas. Orion hadn't quite risen above the neighboring houses and it was somewhat hazy
in the south east, so I turned the telescope to the north and recorded the viewing diamter for my 25mm and 10mm eye pieces.
While I was waiting for Orion, I looked at the Pleiades and the moon. I brought out my 6mm and 4mm eyepieces and tried
them out on Eratosthenes and Copernicus. I was floored! I could see the little craterlettes all around Copernicus as well as
great detail on the small double crater just south of Copernicus. Wow! By this time, Orion was standing proud in the south east
so I walked to the back yard with my star chart and my binoculars and made a quick survey of the sky. I star hopped
from Rigel up then right, then down, following the brightest star and Lo! and Behold! I saw a fuzzy little cloud just above
the setar 39 Eridani! As excited as I was, I worked carefully to bring the XT-10 back around the side of the house
to the back patio. It took a few minutes to find the comet in the telescope, but the 9X50 finder scope really helped.
After studying the comet for a few minutes, I went inside to get Kim to come take a look. It was a few minutes before she
came back out and the comet had moved out of the field of view. I couldn't relocate the comet and it was taking some time, so Kim
went back inside. As luck would have it, a few minutes after she left I found the comet again. So Kim came back out, took
a look and said, "Cool, it looks like a little tomato seed".
12/18/2004 9:45pm- 10:00pm - Seattle frontyard - My nephew Ian and his fiancee Karolyn were in town and we
just returned from dinner. It was the first clear night in over a month so I took the XT-10 outside and looked for
the Machholz Comet. Unfortunately there was a bright street light right in front of where the comet would be, so I
consoled myself and salvaged our viewing time by looking at the Andromeda Galaxy (M31), the Great Orion Nebulae (M42),
and the moon, which is always a showstopper.
10/27/2004 5:30pm-10:45pm - Seattle frontyard and sidewalk - I organized a sidewalk star party to watch the lunar
eclipse. The weather cooperated very nicely and we had a ton of fun. My sister Nan, her husband Todd got to show their 11
month old son, Finley, his first eclipse! Our neighbors Natalie and Lukas came over and so did my long time friend Bobby.
I initially had Holst's The Planets blasting inside on the stereo to make the star party complete. I had the ETX-90
tracking in the frontyard and the big XT-10 next to it, but my estimation of where the moon rose was off so Todd and I
moved the XT-10 down to the sidewalk. This turned out to be a great idea because since it right there on the sidewalk
a lot of people passing by were able to take a look. One young boy riding his bike stopped and took a look I explained
what he was seeing and he exclaimed, "Wow!". Exactly! That's what I always say too! A couple who were waiting for the bus across
the street ran over to take a quick look before their bus came. A man waiting at the stoplight in his car saw the group of us
standing around the telescope looking up at the eclipse and he asked what we were looking at. We told him about the eclipse and
pointed to the moon and he stuck his head out of his truck and saw it. "COOL!", he yelled as he drove on. I'll have to run some
tests to confirm, but it's my theory that a telescope the size of my XT-10 has it's own gravitation field that attracts people
to it! ;) We must have had close to 30 people stop by and look through the telescope. One man riding home from work on
his bicycle stopped and talked with us for over an hour. It was really a great experience to be able to share my telescope
and my (limited) knowledge with so many people. During the totality we turned the telescope on the Andromeda Galaxy. It was
just a fuzzy cloud, but that's not too bad considering we are in the middle of a large city under three glaring street
lights.
10/04/2004 9:06pm-9:53pm - Seattle backyard - Lot's of light pollution in the west coming from the soccer field two blocks away, but
I was still able to catch my first views of M27, the Dumbbell Nebulae! It was a clear evening and not very cold, so I brought my
big XT10 out to the back. I first looked at M57, the Ring Nebulae, amazed at how easy it is to find now in this big scope. I played around
with my focuser, trying to get the best image. After centering M57 in the eyepiece, I added the 2X barlow. I refocused and viewed
M57 at 96X. I wish I could say that I saw color, and that it was really impressive. (Those darn Hubble Space Telescope pictures ruined backyard
astronomers! ;) ) But in the middle of a large city, it just looked like a bigger fuzzy nothing. I consoled myself by remembering
that this planetary nebulae is 1000 light years away. Considering that, I had a pretty awesome view of it! Encouraged by my success of finding M57 so
quickly, I looked at my charts for a new object to hunt for and saw that M27 wasn't far away, at the base of the Northern Cross. I have to admit that I
got lucky finding it. I haven't adjusted to star-hopping with a reflector (the image is upside down and backwards). So I just studied
the map and aimed the telescope to where I estimated the M27 should be. I looked through my 25mm eyepiece and took a mental
image of the stars then slewed up then back down to my starting point. Down, then back up to my starting point. Left then back to my
starting point. I slewed right a ways, and there is was! A big fuzzy nothing, much larger than M57. I switched between my 2X barlow with the 25mm
eyepiece, and the 11mm eyepiece by itself. I believe the 25mm coupled with the 2X barlow offered the best views. Definitely brighter. I finished
up the short evening (I needed to go inside to fold a dryer load of towels for Kim's practice that she needed the next morning) with
a hunt for M13, the bright globular cluster in Hercules. Unfortunately, Hercules was low on the horizon, right above a house to the west with
the bright lights of the soccer field behind. It will have to wait for another evening.
09/30/2004 9~pm - Seattle front yard - Tonight I set up both the XT10 and the ETX-90 in my front yard
and did a side by side comparison of views of the moon. It wasn't very scientific, I must admit. I think I just wanted to see both of my
scopes side by side! They really are beautiful, I think. With 25mm eyepieces (Sirius plossl in the XT10 and Meade Plossl in the ETX-90)
the views of the moon were very similar. Of course I had a bright street light 7 meters away. Which didn't help either. But for very bright
objects, like the moon, the views at low power were comparable. High power is where the light grasp of the XT10 really shows off. I will
design a more useful comparison chart and make a legitimate test later this year. I spent the rest of the evening taking afocal pictures of the moon
with my Nikon CoolPix 3100 and my Orion SteadyPix Universal Camera Mount. I played around with the exposure settings on my camera and I think I might
be on to something. Images can be viewed above.
09/28/2004 5:06am - 6:40am - Seattle front yard/side yard - I just got in from a wonderful morning of viewing. The past few mornings
have been very foggy so I haven't had a chance to aim my big new scope at Saturn or Venus...yet! But this morning I happened to
wake up at 4:45am and I took a look out our bedroom window and saw stars! I quietly got dressed in my wool pants and down jacket
(fall is here!) and went outside. Orion was standing proud in the south while Venus was shining brilliantly in the east. The last time
I saw Saturn was through my ETX last winter. I was really impressed with the views through my new XT10. The Cassini division was much
more prominent and I spotted at least three of Saturns moons. I also took in views of M45, M16, and Venus although it was so bright
it didn't yield much of a view.
09/23/2004 7:00pm - 8:30pm - Seattle front yard - The evening skies were clear and the waning moon was up so I brought out
the XT10 and took a view. Since the moon was so low on the horizon, the air was swimming. I made a sketche of the moon with the Mares
Imbrium, Insularum, Cognitum, Nubium, and Humorum figuring prominently. Tycho, Clavius, et al were among the more impressive craters.
I also looked at my old favorite, the Ring Nebulae M57. While the XT10 is not as easy to aim as my little ETX, the significantly
greater aperture made it much easier to locate this little gem. Our house is in the flight pattern of airliners coming in from the north,
so I'm used to seeing and hearing these bright flashing lights soaring across the sky, but around 8:12pm I noticed a set of three
circular lights in a triangle pattern move across the sky in a southwesternly direction with no sound. There were only the three round, lights
which glowed softly, unblinking. Those UFO's are getting kind of gutsy flying so near large cities. Maybe they were stopping off for a
good cup of joe before heading down to Nevada? I finished up the evening viewing by just slewing randomly through the stars, amazed
at their brillance and sheer numbers.
09/21/2004 9:40pm - 10:15pm - Seattle front yard and back yard - Well, my big dob arrived today! It's bigger than I
thought it would be. It's a big boy to be lugging around the yard. The waxing moon was quickly setting so I set up shop
in the front yard and aimed at the moon for it's official "first light". Either my eye is still untrained or my little
ETX is pretty awesome because the views were similar. Maybe the contrast was a little better. I'll have to set them both
up side by side and run a test...Then I turned it east and took in Andromeda, M31. Well, it is still a fuzzy cloud under
the terrible light pollution from the street lights in front of the house, but even still, I could pick out more detail.
I then moved to the backyard, away from the glares of the street light, but by the time I set it back up,
clouds had rolled in and my viewing was just about shot. So I practiced slewing the scope trying to star
hop from Mirach down to M33. I didn't see it, but I mapped some of the more interesting stars to be more
familiar with the area. I'm really looking forward to seeing Saturn with it.
05/30/2004 8:25pm-10:35pm - Seattle front porch - We got a break from our typical rainy/cloudy Memorial Day Weekend weather and I was able to
view the beautiful 11 day moon and take some images of it. The Autostar tracking system
was behaving well, which is abnormal in my experience, so I was really surprised when I was able to attach the SteadyPix mount and it still tracked
accurately. Since the ETX 90 is relatively small, I had to compensate for the extra weight of the mount plus the camera. I wouldn't recommend using the
SteadyPix with the ETX 90 for this reason. It was very difficult to get the telescope balanced at the same time as adjusting and lining up the camera lens
with the eyepiece. Even so, with patience as my guide I persisted and I was able to capture a few decent images. One can be viewed HERE.
I took images with various settings (Closeup, Nighttime, Party/Indoors, etc) until my memory card was exhausted. So I went back to exploring the surface of the moon.
I was able to insert my 2X Barlow and view Schroter's Valley with amazing detail. When I went inside, I did a quick search on the internet and found this
informative link with an excellent close up picture,
I finished up the evening with a quick viewing of Jupiter and three of its moons, Callisto, Ganymede, and Io.
11/12/2003 8:00pm-11:00pm - Seattle, Kitchen Observatory - This evening I was in our kitchen and I happened to look out the window and I saw
the beautiful waning moon above our neighbors house. Since it was very clear, I decided to bring the telescope in from the other
room and take a look at the moon. I was pleasantly surprised at how clear the viewing was. Our floor is a little bouncy, and the field of view
is limited, but the benefit of being able to view from a warm location is pretty nice. It wasn't even difficult to talk my wife into
taking a look since she didn't have to get bundled up to go outside! I setup the Autostar and after I got it tracking properly, I took a few
afocal pictures of the moon with my Nikon CoolPix 3100 digital camera. The best image can be viewed HERE.
Afterwards I looked at Saturn and played around with my light blue filter and my 26mm, 11mm and 6mm eyepieces. The 26mm eyepiece is definitely the
best for the moon, but I'd like to get a 19mm eyepiece for Saturn.
8/31/2003-9/1/2003 8:30pm -5:15am - Seattle front porch/back porch - I wanted to get some really good pictures of Mars, so I spent some time
earlier in the day fiddling around with my Autostar controller to learn how to get my telescope in Polar mode. Previously I have
only observed in Alt/Az mode. I finally figured it out, although I wasn't able to get the simple controller that came with my scope to track in Polar mode (
I removed the "A" screw from the back of the controller per the instructions, but to no avail) But the Autostar seemed to be working so around 8:20pm I noticed
the beautiful crescent moon just about to drop behind the trees to the south west. I got the telescope all set up and tracking, then
I called Kim out to take a look. We both looked at the moon and marveled at the beautiful surface filled with craters. Afterwards I pulled up shop and moved it all around
to the backyard where the house blocks the street lights. Here I did much battle with my Autostar, Windows 98, and the ETX 90 motors that decide to slew 40 degrees
in some random direction at inopportune moments. So I wasn't able to get even one stinking picture. Frustrated doesn't come close to describing what I experienced. But being an astronomer in Seattle does teach one
to deal with disappointments, so I just unplugged the @#$@#% Autostar, and tossed it across the yard. I then put the telescope back in Alt/Az position and viewed manually.
Ah, very nice. I saw my old favorite, the Ring Nebulae (M57), the Andomeda Galaxy (M31), then Saturn and the Pleiades (M45). A very nice way to end an otherwise frustrating
evening.
8/26-27/2003 12:25pm - 3:05am - Seattle backyard - August 27th, 2003, the closest that Mars will be to earth in my lifetime. Of course, I was in the backyard
looking through my telescope and taking pictures. The only problem was that the directory that I selected in the AstroCam software to save my pictures wasn't created so
all the pictures I took just went to the "bit bucket in the sky". And once I figured this out, the clouds came in and Mars was gone. I blew it. 60,000 years and I'm foiled by
stupid software that can't even check to see if a directory exists when it's taking pictures. So I went inside totally disgusted. But the next night it was clear again, and I was able to get
some decent pictures.
8/2/2003 2:25 - 3:05am - Seattle front porch - Tonight I watched the movie "Total Recall" which takes place on Mars, so afterwards I
set up the telescope and viewed Mars and took some pictures with my QuickCam and laptop. Again, my telescope was under the glare of three
bright street lights but I was still able to get this shot. Some clouds rolled in, so I decided to close up shop and head inside. I'm
looking forward to taking some pictures from some dark skies later this month.
7/22/2003 12:45 - 1:15am - Seattle front porch - Tonight I viewed Mars for the first time this summer. Even though my telescope was under the glare of three
bright street lights, I was able to view the southern polar ice cap and some faint shadowing. This brief viewing made me excited about what I'll be able to see
under dark skies! I made a quick sketch with a Paint program that is HERE.
7/7/2003 10:35pm - Seattle backyard - I bought a used Minolta X-370 SLR camera off eBay, and I ordered the corresponding camera adapter from Orion Telescopes,
so now I am actually doing astro-photography! Above is one of my first results. I am pleasanlty surprised by how well the photo came out considering that 1) I wasn't in really dark skies, 2) I was using color film, 3) I wasn't
using a shutter release cable, and 4) I had a significant light leak in my new (used) camera. I took the camera in and got the light leak fixed, I bought T-Max 400 black and white film, and I bought a shutter release cable
so I have high hopes for my 2nd round of pictures!
5/27/2003 12:30am-2am - Our Seattle backyard - Well, it was a warm clear Friday night so I set up shop in our backyard on our new
flagstone patio! I brought out a campin stool, my telescope, a cooler to set my binoculars and start chart on, and my 35mm SLR camera.
I recently given an Astrophotography book from my wife's grandmother as a b-day present so I'm now dabbling in film astro-photography.
I took my first shot of Cygnus, also known as the northern cross. I had Fuji 200 print film in my camera and I took a 1 second exposure
through my 28mm lens at f 3.3(?). I haven't found my shutter release cable, so I'm not able to use the "Bulb" setting to take longer exposures. :(
So I just aimed the camera on my tripod and used the timer setting to avoid shakes. I then turned west and took a picture of Ursa Major,
better known as the Big Dipper. I used the same settings on it. I'm turning the film in to be developed next week so
get to find out then how well it worked. I'm guessing that the stars will be very faint. But that's where my scanner and photo editing software
will come in handy! After taking these two photos I then became reaquainted with Lyra and the Ring Nebulae (M57). I used averted vision and the
viewing was at least as good as from our balcony at our old apartment. After viewing M57 for about 20 minutes, I turned my scope to a very
bright star below Vega. I looked it up in my charts and discovered that this beautiful star was Altair. I am very pleased to now have an unobstructed
view to the south now. There are sooooo many cool things to look at in the southern sky so I studied my charts and decided to make the
Dumbbell Nebulae (M27) my first objective. I used my binoculars to work my way
east from Altair up to the star just next to M27. I then tried to do the same through my telescope, but I got lost! There are soooo many more
stars visible in my scope that the 3-4 magnitude stars in my binoculars become just another star in my telescope. So after about an hour of unsuccessful
searching, I got tired and decided to go inside to bed.
5/15/2003-9-11pm - Front porch of our house in Seattle - I almost missed the eclipse this evening because of the way Starry Night
displayed the moon. The software program showed that the moon was going to be below the horizon so I didn't bother watching it. Plus it
was typical spring weather in Seattle: windy and rainy. So I was very surprised when I looked out our front window and saw the partial moon
with a *very unusual* shadow on it! I quickly ran inside and grabbed my telescope and set it up on my front porch. The full eclipse had already
happened but there was still a third of the moon still covered in shadow. I took some afocal pictures with our cheap little digital camera, and
they turned out so-so. I posted them above.
5/1/2003 - 9:30-10:00pm, - Backyard of our new house in Seattle!- My wife and I moved into a new house a month ago, so my telescope
has been packed up for awhile. But tonight it was very clear and I couldn't pass up setting the telescope up and taking a look at Jupiter and Saturn.
I viewed them under 48x and 113x and they were both surprisingly clear considering that there are two very bright street lights on the sidewalk
in front of our house. But our backyard is relatively free of direct light pollution.
2/5/2003 - 5-5:45pm, 10pm -Seattle Balcony, It was a clear night and the moon was a beautiful sliver in the pre-dusk sky, so I got the telescope out
and did some observing. I also took some images, which I hope to process and post this week. After dinner I went out on our balcony and
looked at Jupiter at 48x, 96x, 113x, 208x, and 416x. I used my light blue filter which helped a bit, but I still couldn't discern much detail. It
still looked like a croquet ball.
12/26, 12/27, 12/28, 2002 - Wasilla, Alaska - I brought the telescope up to Alaska for Christmas and got to do some very cold observing under very
dark skies! I bundled up in everything I had: polypro, wool, down, balaclava, mittens and my toes and face were still very cold. My bare finger tips
actually stuck to the metal legs of my tripod, it was so cold! But I did get some pictures of Saturn, and we observed Jupiter, the double cluster, Andromeda Galaxy, the Pleiades,
M35, M36, M37, M38, Great Orion Nebula, and we even saw Venus one morning!
11/25/02 8pm-10pm - Seattle Balcony - Tonight it was fairly clear so I got to try out my new Meade 4mm and 6mm Plossl eyepieces. The local Ritz Camera stores were selling
both of these eyepieces plus a shorty 2x Barlow for $39.99. I couldn't pass up that deal! I already have TeleVue 2x Barlow, but its a long so I thought it would also be interesting
to compare the two. I knew that these eyepieces might overpower my small diameter ETX 90, but I was pleasantly surprised. I started off on Saturn and the seeing was so-so
with my 11mm TeleVue eyepiece. I put in the 4mm (312.5x)and it was really blurry I attributed some of this to the mount since I wasn't using my Deluxe mount. I replaced it with the
6mm and at 208 power, the image was much more stable. I went inside for a while then came out when the moon had risen. I started off with the 26mm eyepiece. WOW! I'm always
impressed with this eyepiece when observing the moon. I can see the entire moon and it is sooooo clear and sharpe. I then tried the 4mm and 6mm alternatively and the viewing was
better than I expected. I keep telling myself that I should reserve judgement until I get my telescope under truly dark skies, but since I do 99% of my viewing from my Seattle balcony,
it really doesn't matter what it can do "somewhere" else. I tried the new Meade 2x barlow and it seemed to work very well. I didn't really compare it with my TeleVue barlow. That test
will have to wait for another night. I finished up the evening with trying to resolve the Trapezium in the Great Orion Nebula. I thought I was doing
09/10/2002 10pm-2am - Seattle Balcony - While I was waiting for Saturn to rise I was playing around with the Autostar controller and I am finally
getting familiar with the "GOTO" functions. Every now and then it would slew to the desired object accurately which gives me the idea that I set it up
correctly, but then while it was tracking the motor would suddenly slew off in some random direction 20 degrees from where it was pointing. Argh! It was pretty frustrating. So I just went back and forth between easy to spot objects that I was already familiar with so I could get familiar with
its (erratic) behavior. I was curious to see how (if) the Autostar controller switched tracking speeds between deep sky objects and planets. I found mixed
results. It tracked Pleiades fairly well but then when tracking stars (Alpheratz, Almach) or planets (Saturn) it would track for a minute then slowly slew to the
right off the object. I will have to test it more but I believe that the motor has trouble slewing objects low on the horizon. When slewing from Saturn to Pleiades
it would move accurately to the right (RA) but it would be far too low (declination).
Anyway, after looking at Saturn for a while I saw in my star charts that the open star cluster, Gemini (M35), was about to rise and since I wanted to see a new object I waited around for it too. It was worth the wait! At 5.5 magnitude and under city lights it was fairly faint but considering that it is
2500-2700 Ly away it is pretty impressive!
09/03/2002 10:30pm - Seattle Balcony - WOW! I had quite a surprise as I was stargazing this evening. I had just finished looking at the Andromeda Galaxy,
when I noticed some clouds moving in from the north. They appeared unusual so I called Kim from inside to get her opinion and while we were both looking at
them we saw them shift and change. We were seeing the Aurora Borealis or the northern lights! Way Cool!!!! They put on an impressive show for about 10
minutes, then they went away. Or at least we couldn't see them any more. They were a very light green in color, and there was one main streak that projected
across the sky farther than the rest. We called Kim's parents in Alaska and had them go look outside, sure enough they could see them too.
08/30/2002 1am, 5:30am - Balcony of Seattle apartment. Since it was a Friday night, I stayed up late and took some pictures of the
Moon and Saturn. I started out looking at the Andromeda Galaxy (M31). I hadn't viewed Saturn in a few months, so it was wonderful to
see it again through my telescope! After viewing Saturn at 48x, 113x, and 227x, I moved over to the moon and viewed it for some time.
Since it was a clear night and the viewing was good, I set up to take some pictures with my QuickCam and laptop. I spent about 3 hours taking
pictures of Saturn and the moon. I'm getting more efficient at slewing while looking at the image via the QuickCam image. Afterwards I moved
over to Jupiter which was now up. I had already turned off the laptop, so I didn't take any pictures of it. I finished up with a quick look at the
Great Orion Nebula (M42).
08/14/2002 9pm,11pm,1am? - Tonight I was camping at a remote lake in the North Cascades near Mt Baker. I had thought
about packing in my ETX but I ended up just bringing a small pair of 8x25 binoculars. But under such dark skies, they
were all I needed. But it was good for me to get more familiar with the night sky just using the binoculars. I waited for
the summer sky to darken. It is so cool to watch the stars appear in the sky like tiny diamonds slowly growing in luster.
Finally becoming brilliant points of light. Once it was properly dark I quickly spotted the Andromeda Galaxy (M31), the
Ring Nebula (M57), the open star clusters M103 and M39, and 3 meteors! I also spotted a new object for me: The Triangulum
Galaxy (M33). I fell asleep but awoke a few hours later to see that the Pleides had risen. It took a few minutes for my
tired eyes to clear but it was worth it. The Milky Way was a vivid swath of white arching across the sky. It was amazingly
beautiful. There is nothing quite like it. Under such dark skies the vividness of these objects was increased 100 fold.
I've read that aperture is King but there's no replacing dark, dark, skies!
08/11/2002 9pm - I was too tired to drive out to my "dark sky location" so I just looked out from my balcony
to watch the Perseid meteor shower. Although I was in the city, I did see three very impressive meteors. They all left
brilliant trails as they streaked across the sky.
07/19/2002 9:30pm-11:00pm - Well I was out in the mountains but the moon was "waning gibbous", I believe so the skies weren't
quite as dark as I had hoped. I also didn't count on all the trees which limited my field of view to a sliver in the south towards the moon and
a small patch in the upper eastern sky. I focused in on M57 (Ring Nebula) and at 96x it was pretty impressive. This was the first time that
I've viewed it away from the city lights so I was thrilled. Since my view was so limited I had a tough time locating M39 but I finally found it.
M31 was behind the trees so I didn't have a chance to see it under the relatively dark skies....sniff sniff. But I am making plans to view
next month's (8/11) Perseid meteror shower from a wide open, dark sky location, so I hope to get my chance to see M31 in all it's glory then.
07/14/2002 10:30pm-1:00am - Tonight Kim and I viewed M103 and M31. I tried looking up M33 but I'm just too tired. M103 was fairly
easy to find from the Cassiopeia asterism. Just traverse left from Ruchbah. M31 is just a big cloud with all the light pollution from the city.
I'm hoping to get better views of it next weekend as I'll be out in the mountains...
06/11/2002 10:50pm - I viewed M39 last night! Very cool. Using my charts as well as Starry Night software, I drew a "connect the dots"
map from Deneb. I'm still having problems with my !#@$@#$ AutoStar "goto" device, so I just spotted it manually. It didn't
jump out at me, so I mapped it from two different "connect the dot" maps and verified them both. When I knew I was in the
right spot I looked through the eyepiece and mapped the "stars" I saw. Then I went back to my computer and magnified the
picture of M39 to compare my drawing to. Yep! That was it!!! Cool!!
11/18/2001 1:23am-3:28am - I stood on my balcony under clear skies in Seattle and was treated to an
awesome Leonid display. All told I counted 224 meteors in just over 2 hours of viewing. I can't imagine
what it must have been like to see these under really dark skies. Wow!!!
10/28/2001 1:00am - Tonight was first light for my newly modified Connectix Color Quickcam. I borrowed
a laptop and went outside to take some pictures of Saturn and Jupiter. The images of them were so-so, but
what WAS kind of cool happened by chance. I mistakenly took a picture while the telescope was slewing
across Jupiter and two of its moons, Io and Ganymede, were captured in the image. Jupiter is just a big, bright, blur, but the moons
came out surprising well for a complete accident. The image can be seen HERE.
5/25/2001 12:00am - Just a quick session to show Kim the Ring Nebula. Located it within 5 minutes!
Kim saw it and was impressed.
5/23/2001 8:44pm-1:27am Balcony of apartment. Spent alot of time using Autostar and mapping and
familiarizing myself with the Vega constellation. With Steve's help I searched for the Ring Nebula
(M57?). After many hours of orienting, re-orienting, mapping, and looking through both the binoculars
and telescope I felt fairly confident that I had located the four stars that outline the diamond of
the Vega constellation. By this time my batteries were running down so I switched to manual mode and I
kept panning between the right most stars in Vega searching for M57. After several tangents (got bored
and frustrated) looking over at the N American Nebula, I went back to the two right most stars of Vega
and panned back and forth. I saw one star that I thought could be M57 but as I zoomed in I saw that it
was just a star, so I kept panning. Finally on one pass I noticed a fuzzy nothing that I had somehow
missed all this time and centered on it. My heart lept as I realized that this was the Ring Nebula!
5/20/2001 9:30-10:30pm Volunteer Park Seattle. Trying to see Mars. Too many nearby lights.
Great view west, though. Tried for Whirlpool (M51), but since it is at the Zenith, it's difficult to
locate, and focus. Kim located two neighboring stars near Vega.
4/3/2001 Our balcony, Seattle, Wash 7:10pm
Moon: excellent craters even though it was still light out
(moved to parking lot, looking east)
Moon: excellent craters : twightlight
(8:25pm PST, moved to parking lot, looking west)
Jupiter and 4 moons : Clear skies, as good if not better than 3/19
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O
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Saturn : Clear skies, as good if not better than 3/19
/
0
/
Couldn't locate Orion : too low on horizon
Viewed moon : several large craters with "mountains" in their center. Cool!
(9pm PST, Drove to Dental Lab, University of Washington, parking lot, looking west)
Jupiter and 4 moons : Clear skies, as good if not better than 3/19
Saturn : Clear skies, as good if not better than 3/19
(11:30pm - 1:30pm PST Seattle)
Moon: great contrast, craters were amazing
Spent most of the time looking around Big Dipper (Ursa Major) with a few interludes of Arcturus
when the clouds coverd Big Dipper. Continued to try to find Whirlpool (M51) Thought I spotted
it in binoculars (7x21), centered scope on it, but couldn't resolve it. Got lost several times,
had to back down to 48x power to re-locate it several times. Frustrating, but exciting. Looking
forward to viewing my first galaxy.
3/22/2001 Victorian Inn parking lot at Ouray, Colorado 11:pm MDT Power outage
Saturn and Jupiter had already set. Dark skies, but somewhat cloudy.
Tried viewing Whirlpool Galaxy (M51), no luck
3/20/2001 Victorian Inn parking lot at Ouray, Colorado 10:30pm MDT
Viewed Jupiter and 4 moons (48x, 96x, 113.6x, 227x) : Fuzzy
Viewed Saturn (48x, 96x, 113.6x, 227x) : Fuzzy
Viewed Orion Nebula (48x, 96x, 113.6x, 227x) : Fuzzy
3/19/2001 Englewood, Colorado. 9pm? MDT
Viewed Jupiter and 4 moons (48x, 96x, 113.6x, 227x) : Saw bands, clear
Viewed Saturn (48x, 96x, 113.6x, 227x) : Saw cassini division
Viewed Orion Nebula (48x, 96x, 113.6x, 227x) : Saw color
Viewed Pleides (48x, 96x, 113.6x, 227x) : Tons of stars!!!!
Looked for Andromeda, couldn't find it. Got disoriented.
