August 15, 2009: Henry Coe

Andrea Laczay

(longer, more detailed version: tacosandus.blgospot.com)

As on Friday @ Hogue Park our new friend, Daniel, told us there would be a few people at Henry Coe on Sat., my husband and I drove down there. We arrived quite early, so that we can find a spot that nobody claims as 'reserved'. :)

We set up, and waited. While others claimed to have seen the Green Flash, we just blinded ourselves with the Sun. It did not help of course to find Mercur or Saturn, hopefully next time. As we (especially I) are beginners, we do not have much comparison as to transparency etc. We enjoyed the darkness of the sky, the Milky Way (which was not as sharp as it could have been, as they say).

Anyway, we managed to see several M objects like M8 Lagoon, Andromeda Galaxies, Triangulum Galaxy quite well with our 120mm f/8.3 Celestron refractor. I even managed to find the "ET cluster" own my own, which seemed to be quite a challenge at first. My husband, who is more into challenges, hunted/asked for new targets - facing them with success.

We've learnt how to use averted vision to see some objects in more detail. That's how my husband managed to see even the arms of the Triangulum Galaxy in a min. 18" Dob next to us. With our scope, even with our stronger (2.5") eyepiece we could not make it out.

We of course happily checked out other people's scopes and whatever they were viewing, so we had really nice views of several other clusters, nebulae and galaxies. In return, we offered the cinnamon cake with cherry filling I've baked, but not too many were interested. Maybe next time I'll manage to meet other TACos' tastes or just accept that they're not there for the food. :)