by Jamie Dillon
Liam and I spent the weekend at Meherana, a wild stretch of foothill land just West of Mariposa. We've been going to campouts associated with Meher Baba there for years, had lots of fun with the binocs. Now with a van, we could take some aperture.
Liam, the binocs, Felix and I showed nightsky wonders to quite a few people there. Intriguing parallel to Bob's adventures. These kids and adults were all bright and educated, but there was that same spirit of opening wonder. Questions were asked about distance scales, orientation of galaxies, age of the globulars, a bunch of questions about binary stars. Each night there was one guy who stuck around late and asked interesting and interested questions, both till about moonset.
The first night, Saturday, that crappy seeing was apparently regional. It was 3/5 at best, moderate. Nu Sco wouldn't undress, but then neither would the Double-Double. Beta Sco did look good, both brilliant blue, esp the primary which was incandescent. 5466, as you might imagine, was the first target once I was alone. At 126x the seeing didn't hold up, and at 79x that globular was lumpy darkness with averted vision. You watch, it'll turn into an early summer project. Thanks to Jeff, Albert and Steve for the careful comparisons. Along about 2 am I went into the Bowl of the Dipper and not a galaxy was to be seen there at any speed. I knew for a fact I was seeing some stellar cores, but nary a disk. This was in the midst of a 6.0 transparency (empirically - 19 stars in the Finnish Bootie).
(Felix is a Celestron 11" f/4.5 Dobs with a primary made by Discovery. Was using a 22 Pan, 16mm UO Koenig, 10mm Radian, with a Lumicon OIII. Liam is my esteemed offspring.)
Watched Albireo for dessert. Next night there were big broad swatches of high cloud across much of the sky, till moonset. It was pushing 1 am, I was working on 4 hours sleep, facing Pacheco Pass in wind and traffic the next day, Liam in the back seat of the van needing to get walked some half mile to the tent. I had to pack up. Then, you guessed it, whoa did it clear. 6.0 again, but with excellent seeing, 5/5. Ducked into the Bowl and 3610 jumped out. Right away, to the south of 3610, just above Merak (beta UMa), found a cool arrowhead shape I'd found at Cone Peak the weekend before, with 3488 at the point, and another bright galaxy along the long edge. Definition for days.
Those with deeper charts than the HB D-series: that galaxy just about 40' due West of 3488 is drawn on HB but not labelled. Anyone have a label for it? Thanks in advance.
Spent some time in the nicely dark campground getting dizzy watching the constellations march along. Don't think I didn't hear those galaxies in Ursa Major laughing, though. Sounded quiet only because of the distance. The wind on 152, as well as the traffic, was hairy next afternoon, so I was glad of the sleep. But still haven't ever seen 3669, 3683, 3674, and there's that whole pile of galaxies over toward Phecda...