March 13-14, 2010: Big Pine

Shneor Sherman

Elevation: About 4,000 feet

Equipment: 22" f/4 dob on Equatorial Platform
20mm ES
13mm Ethos
4.8mm Nagler
1.5mm barlow
2X Powermate

Desperate times demand desperate measures. After many frustrating months of lousy weather, especially around third quarter and new moon, I checked weather forecasts and contacted my friend Gene in Big Pine, down 395. He invited me to observe, and I drove down Saturday. It was a spectacularly beautiful drive, mountain and trees covered in snow, but none on the roads. I met Gene at his home; he took me a couple of miles up the road, to utility property where I was to stay and to observe. I set up, and even though it was breezy, the sky was very dark, and the ground hard to see after the power plant lights were shut down. I had no local lights to contend with at all, but a very little bit of skyglow slightly to the east of south. My western horizon was obstructed, but other horizons were quite reasonable.

As I had not been out in quite awhile, I cruised galaxies in Leo and Virgo, Corvus and Coma, finding a lot of joy in my new ES20mm 100° eyepiece. I stuck to that and my 13mm Ethos as the seeing did not support higher magnification. I did view a few galaxies in Leo I. I particularly liked a galaxy group two or three degrees west of Vendematrix, which I had not previously observed. I was pretty wiped out by 1:30 am (standard time), but still had a look at M13 and M57 before crashing.

Sunday night brought a much calmer sky, with no wind. I spent a little time aiming a 30" Starmaster that happened to be set up, for a couple of local amateur astronomers, then set out to view the Double Quasar in Ursa Major, which was rather high in the sky. It's easy to find the location, and when I used a 4.8 Nagler, I saw two tiny blobe, one of which winked in and out a lot more than the other, with a tiny separation between. I spent some time on local eye candy in and around Ursa Major, more time on the Coma Cluster (I stopped counting galaxies after 11 or twelve) where I used my Ethos with a 1.5X barlow, thought about the Corona cluster, but I was totally drained physically as I had not slept well the previous night..

There are good observing locations nearby at just under 7,000 feet (no campers around, either) and I may try that out during the summer.

I may expand on this...
Shneor Sherman