Dinosaur Point skunking

Jamie Dillon

Dino had a set of minor surprises. Not a soul there when I pulled in around 6:40. High stuff everywhere, as there was around the Peak on the way out 156. No signal on my Sprint phone, which almost always gets a signal in the lot there. OK, fallback, there's a payphone by the boat launch. No more, just stumps in the ground.

Ate supper, watched Orion, Gemini, Auriga and the top part of Canis Major punching thru the cirrus. The coyotes made some music, which was actually the best part of the outing. By 8:30 it was obvious that the stuff wasn't gonna drop. Did pull off 156 in SJB, went up to the fork and could see the Peak sitting under the high gunk like the rest of us. Harumph.

Candidly, there was a measurable suck factor in the outing. I really want to go looking for that Wolf-Rayet shell just north of 16 CMa, Sh2-308, that the Animal has been on about more than once. Last night there was no way I was driving anywhere, after a beeeitch of a week at work, so I'm actively jealous of the buddies who got some.

Nice spring weather we're having, maybe do some solar observing tomorrow. Sheesh.

DDK