I was feeling kind of ill (still am actually), and while the sky was somewhat clear it was pretty hazy. Earlier in the week I'd hoped for some clear skies but all the evenings were foiled. Last night, my wife had an appointment so I'd not really planned to do any observing. It was warm, however, and while I was outside letting the dog back in (we're watching a friend's dog) I saw a nifty crescent moon nicely aligned with Venus.
So mustering what little energy I had left I gathered up the pup scope and the digital camera, got set up in the twilight and attempted a few pics. Actually, I shot a lot of photos, but with a digital camera it makes it a lot easier. I was once again smitten with getting a good crescent shot. I took a few shots of the sky with just the camera, then lined up the pup with the 30mm eyepiece and shot about 40 frames with eyepiece projection at all kinds of different settings. The result is up above. Not bad, but it wouldn't blow up for a damn. The seeing wasn't all that good for pictures (though it was pretty good for visual stuff).
Looking at the shots after the fact, visible is the terminator crossing a crater called Taruntius. In the photo it's just to the lower left of Mare Crisium. Barely visible in the photo above (but better in the original shots) is an unnamed peak way beyond the edge of the terminator that when I first started shooting was unlit. In the photo above there is one pixel visible for this peak, and by then end of my shoot it was connected to the "light zone". From Rukl's maps I can see the peak right off the end of Montes Secchi but it's hard to tell if its actually part of that range or not.
Once I was satisfied with my photos, or at least that I had done the best I could right then, I went in and fetched the kids out. We looked at the moon and Venus, and then I swung the scope over to Jupiter and cranked up the power to about 200x. That's where I could tell the seeing wasn't so good, but probably better than usual.
Even worse, however, is this POS mount that I put under this scope. This stupid celestron thing is the worst, and I mean WORST excuse for an alt/az mount ever devised (except for perhaps those mounts that come from department stores, but those don't even deserve to be called a mount). What a waste of $100. And what a way to cripple a nice refractor. *Something* needs to be done. I need to make a new mount or something. It was pretty frustrating trying to show the kids Jupiter with this thing vibrating all over the place and the inability to move it gently to keep something in the field. I should find a nice little eq mount. Or something.
Still waiting for a nice evening to try out the new comet hunting setup and see if I've got the DSC/Computer issues solved. In the meantime, I'm going to nurse my virus.
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Once again our weather cooperated (an unusual thing in itself) and we were treated to the second total lunar eclipse of the year. This one, for a number of reasons, was actually better than the one in the spring, with the exception of the temperature.
With myself in charge of 4 kids for the evening (daughters and the two cousins), the eclipse happening in the mid-evening, and no school the next day, we had pretty good fun watching while doing other things at the same time. One of the great things about lunar eclipses is that they last a long time, long enough for kids to watch for a while, go do something else, then come back and look at it again and see the changes. With the youngest 6 and the eldest 10, that is a good thing.
We were outside for about 30 minutes or so during the last part of partial and the transition to totality, during which we started looking for satellites and meteors. Once we got chilled we headed inside for hot cocoa and watched the final parts through the east-facing picture window.
I declined to get the telescopes out, mostly because it doesn't enhance the experience all that much (it's cool, but with four kids around it's more work that it's worth), and we just enjoyed it like our ancestors did. I did talk to them about how these kinds of things tended to freak people out before they understood what was going on.
So that makes three lunar eclipses in a row. That has to be some kind of record for Minnesota.
Over the summer I had debated about selling Stella, the 8" that I spent so much time with, for the simple reason that I wasn't using it and was sort of thinking to send it to a better home. However, it looks like we're going to be spending a lot of time at the farm in Alexandria next year, and I think I will bring it up there. It would even be possible, if I decided it were worth it, to build a nice little roll off observatory. That is something I have dreamed about in the past. As it is, I need to find/build someplace to keep the stuff up there anyway to keep it clean and dry.
The farm is better than Clear Lake, but not drastically. Where Clear Lake is near the St. Cloud light dome, the farm is near the Alexandria light dome. Enough that the south view is somewhat compromised. However, the view in most other directions is improved, and in general its darker overall, though not hugely. I'll do a better survey next spring.
How much this all translates into additional observing time is unknown, but the kids are all getting big enough to be interested, and perhaps this will fuel some more general observing with them as pupils. There are different distractions at the farm that at the trailer, so it remains to be seen what will happen.
I am, however, going to purchase a shield for the security light in the yard, and make sure that other outside lights are shielded, so at least them we can look at the stars properly, with or without the scope.
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I haven't done much observing in the past few months (years) but there have been a couple of noteworthy events.
Most recently, my wife and I watched the total lunar eclipse from the back yard. It was perfect weather, really, in the mid 60s and no bugs whatsoever. This is the second score on lunar eclipses visible from my house. The other was 3 years ago in January - very cold that night, this was much, much better.
I got outside a bit late, missing the first parts of partial phases. I think that happened last time as well. In any case, I took the pup scope out for this one, and set it up in the yard. The big downside was the power lines. As the moon was pretty low on the horizon, almost everywhere I planted the scope resulted in a power line blocking the view. And the few places I could be clear of the lines, I was getting the full force of the streetlight in the alley. [ I have a solution to that problem, BTW. I have found a laser used for aligning photoelectric sensors that will run nicely with a 9v DC power supply. It is designed to be mounted, so I would simply need to fix a mount inside the garage, drill a small hole in the wall, and aim the laser at the streetlight. Don't know when or if I'll do that, however, but I've got the laser.]
This was a school night, and consequently too late for the kids to watch.
I watched the total phase for about an hour, both with the naked eye and through the scope. My general impression is that it was not as coppery color as the previous eclipse, seeming more brownish. I tried to take a number of photos with the digital camera, proving to be a futile effort. I needed the muscle of the 8", I suspect, and a second tripod for holding the camera.
Lately I've been thinking about celestial navigation, and it's relation to sailing. I think one thing I would like to do someday is take a long sailing trip using only sun, moon and stars as primary means, when practical. Of course, I'd never compromise safety just for this type of exercise, and I'd probably verify my positions using at least GPS, if not additional methods as well.
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The weather forecast had been gradually deteriorating as the weekend came closer, but I packed the Pup to bring along to the camper just in case. I'd actually wanted to do some comet hunting, but the newt is still buried in what was once the darkroom. The next couple weeks should allow me to get it out and get it cleaned up.
The long holiday weekend only provided one night to possibly observe - Sunday-Monday. I rained from Friday afternoon to Sunday morning. I had hoped to attempt some photos of the crescent moon through the little refractor with a home-made shutter. By itself, the mirror of the camera will vibrate the scope, so I'd hoped to use a modified version of the "hat trick" that would allow me short enough exposures.
While packing up the equipment, my eldest daughter asked if she could come along and observe with me. I think this was the first time she's actually asked to come along on a specific session. She's just over 5 now. Being that I didn't have a specific plan in mind and the weather quite marginal, I agreed to wake her up at 3:30, if it were clear, and she could decide then if she was still willing. After laying out warm clothes, I set the alarm on Sunday evening and we went to sleep with clearing skies.
At 3:30, the twittering alarm woke me and I checked the sky through the trees. The cold, damp air was unmoving and bright Vega shone through a gap in the branches. I gently roused a sleepy girl, who happily awoke and still wanted to come along. We dressed in warm layers, collected a small bag of cookies and a blanket, and headed for the truck. After making the short drive to the site, we noticed the fog. It wasn't enough to prevent seeing stars, but it did reduce the limiting magnitude considerably. I had expected to see the moon on the horizon, but I soon realized that it was obscured by a band of clouds to the east.
I pointed out some of the major constellations and stars to my daughter - Polaris and the dippers, Deneb and Cygnus, Vega, Cassiopeia. We got the little scope set up, and the eastern sky was already showing some lightening. I star hopped to M31 so she could see a galaxy. Shortly after that, we both saw the crescent moon breaking through the eastern clouds, so we moved on.
We spent about 30 minutes or so looking at the moon at various powers. I had set up the tripod as low as it would go. I could comfortable kneel while my daughter stood at the eyepiece. She got a little cold, and so sat in the truck while I attempted a couple of frames. I'm not sure what the result will be.
With the sky getting gray, we packed up and talked about the moon rising over fog shrouded farm fields. It was fun. We were out for about 45 minutes or an hour, which is a good amount of time for a young person. Bonus, even, that is was before dawn.
We got back to the camper and slept more, waking up to more clouds and wind. Later in the evening, the two of us spent an hour creating an observing journal for her out of an old notebook. In a way, I'm sure she had as much fun doing the journal as she did actually observing :-) But that's ok, going observing with Dad is like two events, being out under the stars and then spending time with the book. I added some labels to the lines: date, time, equipment, objects, and she practiced writing by filling in words. Then, on the back of the page, she added some "sketches" (in crayon) of the moon and stars and the galaxy. It would be fun to fill that notebook.
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During the day, it had been cold - bloody cold. I had taken the kids to our camper the previous night, hoping the break in the clouds would hold, but by the time we arrived the clouds had moved in for good. It dropped into the 30s F overnight, and barely crawled it's way into the 40s by mid-afternoon the following day. The wind howled and blew intermittent rain around under fast moving, deep gray clouds.
A change was coming, however, and in the late evening as we drove home the cloud cover was breaking up. By 10 pm, kids in bed and stuff unloaded, it was mostly clear with occasional fast moving cloud banks. The wind on the ground had mostly died making the air much more comfortable, though still rather cold. I laid out a blanket to kneel on, and set up the pup scope and set about finishing off the lunar club certificate. Much to my surprise, the sky was very steady, probably the most stable sky I've had to look through in doing all this lunar observing. I was longing to go higher than 100x.
It was a nice night to wrap up on, that's for sure. This is a nice, satisfying, if non-exciting accomplishment. I'd say it's probably as difficult as a Messier certificate. It's taken me the better part of 6 months, and a Messier certificate would likely take about as much to compensate for seasonal variations. Theoretically, you'd be able to do this certificate in a single lunar cycle. In a place like Arizona, you probably could. But here, not a chance. There is never that much clear weather.
But now I feel like I have a basic understanding of the main features of the Moon. I tried to keeps some notes on various formations, and I still would like both a nice sketch and a good photograph. Coming soon is A Portfolio of Lunar Drawings by Hill, an interesting collection that hopefully will inspire my own drawings. I think, though, that drawing will be difficult without a guided mount. We'll see, though, and still worth trying.
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