Coe 1-4-03

by Rob Hawley

After pushing the aviation weather I felt obligated to go after all. It turned out reality split the earlier and later forecasts. The sky cleared about 9:30. Before that time Saturn was popping in and out of the clouds. Fortunately that direction had the best seeing.

A helpful co-observer that works in Scope City taught me how to collimate my scope. It is amazing how much better it works now. I then help someone else set his up.

About 10 the sky was really good in the direction of the big dipper. I had wanted to check out some of the galaxies in that direction so several of us started pointing our scopes in that direction. We got good views of M81, M82, M96, Owl etc. It was interesting to see how they looked in the different scopes. I do not have a lot of practical viewing experience so it was useful to calibrate my expectations on what I should be seeing.

We got good views of Saturn early in the night. No one was satisfied with his view of Jupiter.