by Bob Jardine
No, I'm not a dark-sider. But they really did invite all of us, and the dark skies of Lake San Antonio were attractive. Plus the imagers really are nice guys -- really -- in spite of their strange ideas about observing; I didn't understand a word of what they said to each other most of the time, but that really wasn't the point. They needed a token visual observer, and I was it. (Others were Ivor Barker & son, Paul Lefevre, Paul Sterngold, Peter Santangeli, Phil Terzian, and Dan Wright.)
I probably would have gone down Thursday for the whole three-day bash if the weather reports had been more optimistic, but they weren't, and I had lots of work to finish up, so I skipped Thursday. I had long planned to take Friday off from work, so when the Friday morning weather reports started taking a small turn for the better, I packed the car and took off.
Observing with 12.5" Portaball (f/5)
Partly cloudy, and a short night. But not a complete waste of time. We did have a couple of pretty decent windows for several hours of observing.
| NGC 2818 | revisiting this PN + OC in Pyxis. I'm glad I came back to this object here, since it is quite a bit South. The cluster is unresolved at low power -- just a small, roundish glow. The PN itself shows up only at higher power (about 90X in this case). A UHC filter makes it stand out pretty well. Round, medium small, not apparently annular, gray. |
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| NGC 2997 | a galaxy in Antlia. This was a little bit difficult to locate, but eventually it yielded to careful hopping. I found it with a 35 Panoptic, but got the best view at about 90X (17 Nagler). More power made it worse. Largish, oval, slightly elongated, dim diffuse glow. Very slightly brighter center. Near a little zig-zag asterism. |
| NGC 4856 | H400 galaxy in Virgo. Easy to locate right next to a bright asterism -- an isoc. triangle with a star in the center. With th 17mm, it is small and dim, but "obvious", somewhat elongated, definitely a bit brighter in the center, almost looking stellar. At higher power (9mm) the central brightening is seen to be not stellar, but little other detail comes out. |
I started looking for nearby 4877 and 4902, but the sky crudded up before I found them. Then I went into a mode of checking out eye candy wherever there were nice sucker holes. M3, M5, and M51 were all looking very nice. At about 1AM it clouded up pretty much everywhere, so I headed off to my tent.
It rained on us mid-afternoon, but cleared nicely by sunset. It was looking good. And it turned out to be good, too. A little cold (I think one of the Pauls said 27), a little wet (98%), but good skies. OK, so it was a lot cold and a lot wet, but the skies were really quite nice, so we tolerated it. I was prepared for the cold clothing-wise, and my Portaball has built-in anti-dew heaters for both the secondary and finder, so only the EPs were a problem. Oh, and the charts -- I had to keep wiping the ice off of them.
Knowing that LSA is a couple of degrees farther South than I normally observe, I planned my observing targets accordingly. Hence 2818 and 2997 last night. Tonight would be mostly H400 hunting, so I sorted my remaining H400 targets South to North and went after the most Southerly first. That meant 4856, 5054, 4781, 4958, and 4995.
As I have been doing recently, I tried to locate everything listed in SA 2000 near my H400 targets. This involved two galaxy hops.
I started the first one hopping at 4856, last night's only target. I observed all of my targets and the following along the way: 4902, 4899, 4825, 4782 & 83, 4790, 4760, 4742, 4818, 4728, 4948, 4958. Details are below if you like.
At about 11:30 I did a limiting mag check in Bootes. 19 stars = mag 6.0. Pretty good, given that I'm usually 0.2 or 0.3 worse than most folks. But still not quite as good as it can get at LSA; I guess it was no surprise that the transparency was off just a little bit. Dan Wright confirmed my count.
| M104 | the Sombrero was well placed about midnight, so I stopped there before my second galaxy hop. This might have been my best view of it ever. Large, bright, elongated. Very black dust lane running E/W. Bright center North of the dust lane; a little roundish glow South of the dust lane. |
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The second hop started South of Spica, but here I was seeing more galaxies than are listed in SA2000, so I switched to Uranometria. Again, I found all of the targets and these in addition: 5077 (5079), 5088, 5110 or 5111, 5105, 5044, 5047, 5037, and 5049 (suspected).
After the galaxy hops, I turned to some other Southern targets. I had planned some of these by noting their transit times, so that I could observe them optimally.
| M83 | this Messier object is really pretty pathetic from farther North. I saw it from South of the equator last summer with a 4" scope and had a better view of it than with a 10" scope from home. I finally realized what all of the fuss was about. Now at LSA, on a pretty dark night, I got an even better view. Huge, round, very bright center, almost stellar. Hints of spiral arms (in 17mm Nagler). Switched to a 27mm Panoptic and the spiral structure is no longer hinted at -- it's there. This is a beautiful object. |
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| NGC 5253 | galaxy in Centaurus. Nice, small, bright, elongated, brighter center. |
| 3 Cen & 4 Cen | two nice bright beautiful doubles near 5253. |
| NGC 5292 | small and dim, nothing special. |
| NGC 5668 | pretty small, medium dim (not obvious), a little elongated? hard to tell; looks asymmetric; maybe a little bit brighter center. |
| NGC 5638 | pretty small, dim, round, maybe slightly brighter center; not much to write home about. |
| NGC 5986 | wow! big, bright glob in Lupus at almost - 40 dec. How did I miss this one before? Not well resolved (probably just too low), but grainy; looks slightly asymmetrical. |
At this point, I tried some more galaxies back up in Virgo, but transparency had started deteriorating. Did a few more eye candy objects (M57 was nice; M22 wasn't up quite high enough yet).
Packed it up about 4:00 AM. I'd been fighting dew all evening, then later the dew was turning to ice. That didn't stop any of us, however, but finally when the skies diminished, it was time to give in. A pretty thick layer of frost was on every surface.
All in all, I am glad I went, in spite of the long drive. I can honestly say that, now that I'm mostly recovered from the frostbite.
Started at 9:40. Hopping mainly with 35 Panoptic and 17 Nagler; details often viewed in 9mm Nagler.
| NGC 4856 | reobserved. See notes from last night. |
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| NGC 4877 | not seen. |
| NGC 4902 | medium size, roundish, pretty dim. Very slightly brighter center. No elongation seen. Forms an equilateral triangle with two stars of equal magnitudes close by. |
| NGC 4899 | elongated N/S -- right next to a bright star showing in SA2000. Dim, elongated, not much brighter center. |
| NGC 4825 | small, dim, round; hardly there at all; shape uncertain. |
| NGC 4782/3 | looks like a double bump of light; twin smudges, very small, very close; can't really tell much other detail. |
| NGC 4802 | not seen. |
| NGC 4790 | same FOV with 4781 and 4760 and a nice little double star. Pretty small and dim, shape uncertain. |
| NGC 4760 | same FOV as 4790 and 4781. Also pretty small and dim, shape uncertain. |
| NGC 4781 | somewhat between 4790 and 4760; much larger, a little bit brighter than those; a little elongated and some mottling suspected. |
| NGC 4742 | not seen at first, and not seen in the 17mm; finally seen in the 9mm; in same FOV as 4781 and the cute little dble star; 4742 is near the dbl; small, bright, nearly stellar. |
| NGC 4818 | elongated n/s, pretty thin, pretty bright; right next to 3 stars that are also oriented N/S. |
| NGC 4728 | round, dim, not brighter center. |
| NGC 4948 | same FOV as 4758 (17mm); elongated and very dim; barely there (ghostly). |
| NGC 4958 | same FOV as 4748; smaller, much brighter than 4748, much brighter in center; elongated; very obvious. |
| NGC 4995 | obvious, just South of a star that is just south of a much brighter star; slightly elongated E/W, not much brighter in center. |
Finished around 11:20.
Second hop. Started at 12:15 AM; hopping from 68 Virginis.
| NGC 5077 | or is it 5079? Both are shown in Uranometria, but I see only one; which one? The one I'm seeing is pretty obvious. |
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| NGC 5088 | same field of view as 5077 or 5079, just west of 68 Vir. Just a dim smudge. |
| NGC 5105 | another dim smudge; same FOV as 5077/9 & 5088. |
| NGC 5111 | or is it 5110? Again, it is hard to tell which one I'm seeing -- but I'm not seeing both. Started hopping now from 53 Virginis. |
| NGC 5054 | pretty obvious, big and funny looking; not much brighter in center, but shape is not clear. |
| NGC 5044 | again, pretty obvious, but smaller than 5054; a bit brighter in center. |
| NGC 5037 | dimmer than 5044, but not just suspected; elongated. |
| NGC 5047 | also dimmer than 5044; again, not just suspected, but pretty dim. At this point (about 12:40), the 9mm dewed up, so I switched to a 12.5 LE. Now I can also suspect another galaxy in this area: |
| NGC 5049 | small, dim smudge; barely more than suspected; no detail. Finished just before 1:00 AM. |
Posted on sf-bay-tac May 04, 2004 22:52:54 PT
Converted by report.pm 1.1 Jul 11, 2004 09:13:40 PT