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June 5 night at the Peak

by Paul LeFevre

Despite weather worries, Saturday June 5th turned out to be a great night at Fremont Peak.

I arrived earlier than usual, hoping to get a good spot to view elusive south-east objects on my Messier list through the gap between the trees and the mountaintop. I got the spot, and did get to see most of what I was looking for, but my location had it's down side as well. Note to self: next time, don't set up next to Michelle Stone when you're trying to do near-the-horizon work. She keeps finding cool things in her nice scope, and the long lines of people waiting to look through her scope keep blocking horizon views . It was nice to meet Michelle in person, and see the usual gang as well. The two most enjoyable parts of the evening, though, were watching Ray Gralak work his new AP-mounted refractor and ST-7 CCD system, and showing things off to the Boy Scouts camped nearby. Ray got some amazing shots with his new CCD system -- if he does that well on the first night he's had this equipment, I predict he'll be knocking our socks off completely in a couple of months when he's finely tuned his setup and fully learned how to use it.

On to observing...I'm still working on completing my Messier list, and I added 22 more to the catch on Saturday. Most of the new items were down in Scorpius and Sagittarius, not far above the horizon and difficult to time as they passed through the SE "gap" at the SouthWest lot. I also visited some old friends, showed off "neat" stuff to the visiting Boy Scouts, and spent some time admiring Ray's CCD images and joining the line of folks looking at Mimi Wagner's finds in the 20" (boy, she's good!). I also spent about an hour parked in my chair, admiring the view of the Milky Way and sweeping it with my binoculars. After 3 weeks of no observing at all, it was fantastic to get out and get some photons, and as always the company was enjoyable and helpful!

Fremont Peak Saturday June 5/ Sunday June 6 1999
6" f/8 Dobsonian, 8x40 binoculars

New Objects Observed

Old Friends