by Derek
Saturday the weather at FP was much better than the Clear Sky Clocks seemed to suggest they would be when I left home. I committed a cardinal sin by picking new astronomy equipment on the way to the Peak, but I guess since I wasn't planning on using the STV last night the weather gods let me slide. So until ~10:45 the conditions were clear and dry, with a slight breeze. Using the 14.5" Teleport at 75 or 125X it was easy to see 6 stars in the trapezium all night
Although the fog did not come in there seemed to be some valley haze which reduced the light a bit. There were 3 scopes besides mine in the SW parking lot. I guess everyone stayed home to watch the Raiders.
I have been working on the list of the top 500 objects and logged 20 more, including the Horsehead Nebula. I have an old Nikon Microscope head I have adapted to my scope. The magnification is a bit high (250-300?), but the Orion Nebula was bright enough that I spent quite a while studying it and enjoying the 3D feel binos give.
When the wind picked up I waited a little while to see if it would die down. It didn't and you could smell the moisture in the wind so I decided to packed up before everything got wet.