by Richard Ozer
There was a sizable group at Del Valle Sunday night.
I was there with Peter Trinkl, a Chabot Telescope workshop junkie, who recently completed his 8" DOB. Bruce Jensen was there with one of his co-workers... (we all took turns trying to get him excited about the various fuzzies we were looking at). Rich Naverette showed up with his 12" Meade Dob. Dave Bush arrived, figuring that a damp cold windy night filled with dried grass and pollen would help cure his cold. And, a couple of others whose names I've forgotten.
This had to be the brightest quarter moon I've ever seen. I don't know if it was the moisture in the air or the wide western horizon at Del Valle, but that thing was BRIGHT! However, the moon was one of the more interesting objects. I had noticed with amazement how the extreme southern terminator faded into darkness and then re-emerged as "islands of mountain tops" strung out like a string of bright beads. In Bruce's scope we could see the outline of the lunar disk with the mountain tops emerging, In my scope, it was as if these bright beads were hanging in space. I've seen this before, but it was particularly dramatic last night.
I spent most of the night on a wild goose chase for impossible to see objects, such as IC-5146 (the "Cocoon Nebula") which I knew nothing about and was foolish enough to believe the Magnitude 7.0 / 9.5 central star designation in my chart. Bruce later informed me that it was kind of a joke and that a really dark sky is necessary to make out anything at all.
But, I did have some success, some of the notables being.... NGC 7129, a reflection nebula in Cepheus and NGC 6811(hole in a cluster) in Cygnus. NGC 6939 in Cepheus is a very dense and bright open cluster worth checking out. I stumbled on it while trying to detect NGC 6946, a nearby spiral galaxy that is quite large in field of view but was extremely dim. While in Cepheus, I found NGC 6951, a much brighter galaxy than 6946 and then proceeded to spend the rest of my time comparing views of various notables with and without an ultrablock...
It was too damp and too bright. The seeing was lousy in all directions but north, but the evening and company was great fun all the same....
My observing sessions often end with an driving related adventure (anyone want a ride!) and this was no exception. I turned on KGO and started to listen to a useless and rehashed discussion about Firestone tires and Ford Explorers. Not 20 seconds into the discussion I heard a loud pop and hiss and spent the next half hour on the side of the 580 changing a tire.... No, it wasn't a Firestone..... I decided not to listen to the radio any more, lest they begin a discussion about exploding gas tanks....
Have a good labor day.