Fremont Peak, Aug 7

by Peter Natscher

It was a very enjoyable 3-hour observing period for me at Ranger Row with my 20˛ Starmaster. I knew it was going to be a good evening after easily splitting Antares at 150X at dusk. Its tiny secondary was very sharp as a tiny stellar pinpoint lying well off to the west of blazing Antares. I hadnšt seen it this well since a past observation up at Lassen (Bumpass Hell parking lot). Later on, mag. 12-13 planetaries of all sizes were easily found within a well-defined Milky Way from Sagittarius up to Cygnus. The seeing was superb with the very transparent and dry weather conditions we had though it was shortened by the rising last quarter moon after 12:30am. The resulting contrast was so good that using an O-III filter didnšt add to any planetary nebulašs visibility improvement. Views through the 20˛ Starmaster appeared refractor-like up to 300X. Stars easily snapped into sharp focus affording me to see mag. 16+ stars among a few planetaries. Naked eye, the Milky Way had that sprinkled sugar look sharply detailed by the galactic dust. The temp. remained at a balmy 70°F until the time I packed up at 12:45am. This is my favorite time of year up at the Peak.

Posted on sf-bay-tac Aug 08, 2004 19:37:58 PT
Converted by report.pm 1.2 Jan 23, 2005 17:21:44 PT