11/04/2008, Farnsworth Ranch, Arizona City AZ
As usual, I made it out to the dusty field at Farnsworth Ranch later than I intended, after a morning that was busier than I should have allowed. A busy morning generally leads to a relatively short night. I was not as stressed by this as I might have been, however, since I'd already decided to treat this as more of a social occasion than an observing session. I wanted to meet some people and hang out with friends I see at most twice a year, and I wanted to check out four recently acquired eyepieces: a 13mm and 8mm Orion Stratus (acquired through Starizona), a 3.5mm Stratus (bought used), and a 40mm Paragon that I lucked into just before AASP. A different set of priorities from past gatherings.
The drive out was uneventful, if dusty along the unpaved stretch. Only the last seven tenths of a mile presented a challenge, with the bit of road (really a dirt track along a fallow cotton field) leading directly into the field crossed by several deep, narrow gullies. These gullies were crumbling around the edged, and tended to give way as you tried to carefully drive into and out of them, leading to bouncing lurches instead of slow dips. I was sure the Newt would be in need of major collimation when I unpacked it. But as usual, nothing could have been further from the truth. When the Newt was up, all it needed was a minor adjustment of the primary mirror. Having negotiated the gullies, I drove slowly down the west side brush line, looking for familiar faces. There were far fewer vehicles parked out there than I would have expected, given the predicted conditions (clear, cool, with fair to average seeing). At last I spotted Jim napping in the shade of his truck. With his assistance, I set up the Big Top, giving us both a more comfortable place in which to sit and talk. We chatted our way through the afternoon, watching the occasional vehicle roll in, both of us wondering where everyone was. Friday night had been busier, he told me, but many of those folk had packed up and driven off at daybreak. As it turned out, very few of those Friday nighters ever returned. Apparently it had gotten a lot colder that night than had been predicted, and few were prepared. This worried me a bit, as I too was not prepared for a cold night.
Ron arrived with yet another hand crafted observing chair. The recipient, Peter, carried it off with a certain amount of gleefulness, bringing to mind a child who has just visited a candy store. Since I sit on a chair from the same source, I can well understand his delight.
As the day drew to a close some new arrivals did show up, and there was the usual renewal of acquaintances, and the chance to attach faces to the names of Cloudy Night members - mostly from the Phoenix metro area. The usual raffle was held, and afterward I took a bit of time to stroll around and see what sorts of telescopes had found their way into the desert. A representative from Meade was on sight, with one of their LightBridge truss dobs, giving me my first look at such a scope. If the sample on hand was truly representative, this line of telescopes deserves the praise I've seen them receive.
The sun set and the sky gradually grew dark and star filled, a perfectly clear sky in a patch of desert caught between two growing cities. It is true that more of the northern and southeastern skies are lost in glowing light domes each year, but the site still delivers. And once it was dark, it was possible to forget such imperfections and concentrate on what could be seen. The crowd of the raffle and the dinner that followed quickly dispersed, but curiously, it did not quiet down as much as I would have expected - at least, not for a few hours. This AASP will stand out for me as being one with low attendance, but with a certain restless quality to those who attended. I shared the view with so many people (both directions, with the Newt and through the telescopes of others) that it all began to have a public star party feel. Now, I have the bad habit of getting so wrapped up in observing at such an event that the social aspect simply goes past me, and wanderers in the dark pass unnoticed. But on this night people were walking right up to me and asking what I had in the eyepiece. I simply don't recall that happening before. Since I was not doing any serious work, I had no problem with this, and had a number of enjoyable conversations with people I will never recognize by the light of day. I shared views of M31 through the Paragon that delighted visitors, and got some very good reactions to the Stratus 21mm + CS OIII filter combo and the Veil Nebula. The Paragon also gave M45 a good showing, so much so that a young lady was ensnared by the view and seemed unlikely to leave - even though Mom was right there patiently awaiting her turn at the eyepiece.
The seeing conditions, combined with Jupiter's location in the southwest sky, made serious Jupiter observations nearly pointless. Clear and transparent the sky may have been, but the seeing was average at best. I'd wanted to test the Stratus eyepieces on Jupiter to see how they performed as planetary EPs, but could only get a clear look with the 13mm; anything more powerful (including the UO Orthoscopics I generally use for this purpose) gave a mushy view since the seeing did not support much magnification. Beyond that, though, the new eyepieces certainly lived up to hopes and expectation. I tested the new Stratus focal lengths on M57, beta Cygni, the Double Double, and the Double Cluster, to name a few, and in all cases they performed nicely, with the comfortable eye relief that remains one of the main reasons I've opted for this eyepiece line. (I observe without glasses, but have nonetheless come to appreciate eyepieces that I don't have to practically crawl inside of to use effectively.) The 40mm Paragon was nothing less than a revelation. Being somewhat 'object oriented' and having an EQ mounted scope with drives, the need for huge fields of view has not been a priority for me. At least, not the way it is for owners of Dobsonian mounted telescopes. The acquisition of a 2" 32mm Agena SWA (which works well enough combined with a Paracorr) convinced me that even with a driven scope, some celestial objects really deserve the wider view. And so when the chance came to get this Paragon at a good price, I took it. Unlike the 32mm SWA, which really needs to the Paracorr to work well, the Paragon required no such assistance. In fact, I never got around to adding the Paracorr to it to see what the effect might be. Pleased as I am with my Stratus purchases, the 40mm Paragon ended up being the star of the show. The view through it of M42 and its vicinity, with a 2" OIII filter in place, was nothing short of stunning.
The temperatures dropped rapidly after to sunset went down, and the deepening chill was made a little harder to ignore by a gently, but persistent breeze. The sky was good enough, though, that I was damned if I was going to give up any sooner than could be helped. I had a knit cap and chemical hand warmers, so the cap went on and pair of the hand warmers was dropped down the back of my shirt. A useful trick, passed on to me by someone at a Messier Marathon a few years ago. Get those warmers down over your kidneys, through which every drop of blood must eventually pass, and you can spread that warmth throughout your body quite effectively. Doing so allowed me to keep at the eyepieces until after midnight, when the temperature had dropped to 44 degrees F. Not bone chilling cold by most standards, but if you are dressed for temperatures in the 60s F, the low forties can be a bit unpleasant. The night grew quieter as the more restless folk gradually gave in and sought the warmth of blankets and sleeping bags. A few packed it up in the dark and drove off for good and all.
Between being a bit worn out by the earlier half of the day, and being eventually chilled no matter how cleverly I placed those hand warmers, I finally called it quits sometime between midnight and 1 a.m. MST. I didn't feel cheated, though. It had been an evening well spent, experimenting with eyepieces that I now know will greatly enhance future observing sessions. I even slept fairly well in the back of the Subaru, the problem of cold-feet being solved this trip by a pair of slippers containing a couple more hand warmers. At some point in the wee hours I needed to get up and avail myself of the portable facilities, and was treated to a gleaming vision of Orion and the winter Milky Way. I just stood and stared, and never really considered hauling gear back out into the open. A wide eyed view in the chilly desert air was just fine, and ended up being one of the truly memorable parts of this year's gathering in the desert.
Just before sunrise I hauled myself back out into the open. A beautiful waning crescent Moon was low in the east, bright in a dim blue sky. By the time the sun was up I was pretty much packed and ready to roll, but did not hurry. No one else seemed inclined to hurry, either. The rush of sunrise departures that normally characterize All Arizona events didn't happen this time. I helped Jim heft his big dob into the back of his truck, then Ron in to town for breakfast and coffee, as we so often do. And as usual, this provided a pleasant end to a rewarding event.
|
09/15/2008
After a couple of years slowly gathering the information and putting it into what (I hope) is a usable format, I was finally able to post the Collinder's Catalog of Open Star Clusters on the Cloudy Nights website. You can find it by following the link of the same title in the Favorites list to the right of this entry.
NOTE: The entry ô¼Norm in the catalog is a misrendering of "mu Normae." What you should see there is the Greek letter Mu followed by the abbreviation for the constellation Norma.
My thanks to Nancy Thomas for her assistance in getting this thing off the ground.
|
08/05/2008, Tucson AZ
I took a break a little while ago to wander around in the Monsoon heat and humidity, and somewhat paradoxically, to get a cup of coffee. (A hot beverage in an air conditioned building not being that much of a contradiction.) On my way back I glanced up to check on the afternoon cloud build up. You see, this time of year in Arizona thunderstorms powered by convection are commonplace, and as humid as it was, I assumed there would be clouds blooming as I watched. And sure enough, the blue sky between the clouds that had already popped up was filling with gauzy streamers of vapor. It thickened and brightened and became a small cloud that slowly swelled in size as I watched. I never tire of this show, and look forward to it (and the storms and rain) every summer, even though it means moon watching is a moot point.
Tracing the edge of the growing cloud, I suddenly spotted something very familiar, with a solid, curved edge that no cloud can shape. It was the three day old moon, the same color as the clouds and just visible against the hazy blue midafternoon sky. I looked twice make sure I wasn't imagining it, but sure enough, there it was.
I realized today, in a new way, that I've developed an automatic search image. I'm so Moon orient that, apparently, there is a portion of my brain that comes online and filters the visual data stream for anything moon-shaped. As a result, a very young La Luna stood out for me in the steamy afternoon sky.
In a few monents the growing cumulus cloud covered that part of the sky. But that few moments, for some reason, really made my day.
|
