I finally got to Lake Sonoma (Lone Rock) for the first time since moving to Berkeley 2 months ago. As others mentioned before, there were ~8 scopes there, so it was a good-sized group. One of the people brought his two 9-year-old daughters, who seemed to enjoy looking at M13 and M51. I got to see M51 through a 17.5" Dob - what a view! Aperture envy! Knots in the arms were clearly visible. The bridge between the two galaxies was faint but definitely there. The smaller one showed an obvious bar, while the bigger one filled the field with spiral.
We looked for the supernova which had been reported last week, but to no avail. Cancer is far enough W that it was too low before the sky darkened. I could barely see the host galaxy in my C8.
Mercury showed a decent crescent in my Ranger. Jupiter below Mercury and only showed one or two bands and three satellites, one quite close to the disk. I didn't wait to see if it was coming or going. Mars was extremely bright, but the seeing was too poor to let me see anything but a polar cap. The seeing started out OK (when Mars was low), but then crapped up to the point where I had trouble splitting epsilon Lyrae.
The weather was so warm that I was in shirtsleeves for most of the night. There was no wind until quite late, though a bit of a breeze did appear later on. Still, for anyone who observed through Hurricane Coe, it hardly counted. The transparency was not great, as a persistent haze enveloped the whole Bay area. It seems to have cleared out today. Perhaps the bad seeing was a result of the new air mass being swapped in.
I spent the bulk of the night on galaxies, starting with the host of that SN, then going on to 6208 (the one by M13), then diving into Virgo and Bootes in quest for Herschels. I logged ~38 objects, all but a couple of them galaxies. It took a while, but I finally got through the "Galaxy Country" part of the Herschels, and none too soon as some of my objects were getting low by the time I got there. Unlike Jay, I can't polish off an hour of RA in Virgo in less than an hour of real time. Next stop: Glob City. Two more pages and I'll have done my H400.
Around 0300 I'd completed a page of Herschels and rewarded myself with eye candy - M11, M16, M7, M17, M20, M8, M13 again. Even with crappy seeing, they were what I'd come there for. I was alone by that point, and packed up thinking nervously about how some mountain lions have learned how easy it is to catch and kill a human. I didn't actually see any wildlife, but did hear coyotes in the distance plus some rustling in the nearby bushes.
I may or may not be there next week - depends on certain obligations in San Jose. However, I will come back sometime.