[AZ-Observing] Colorado River Star Stare

The Colorado River Star Stare of 2007 will go down in history as the Great Dust 
Bowl adventure.   We were located north of Blythe CA. about 25 miles at a site 
similar to Sentinel AZ.  A broad flat powder dry area of desert.  Friday night 
was over cast until 11:00 when the clouds parted and we had a 7/10 night until 
3:00 Saturday morning when the wind started to howl, hard enough to pull the 
stakes out that held my tent down. I ended up sleeping in the GMC to get out of 
the wind.  Friday night we feasted on hot dogs, hamburgers, chips, drinks and 
cookies, provided by the club at no cost to us.  Saturday morning we were 
served breakfast burritos, rolls and coffee. The ATV's, dirt bikes and 
dunebuggies started rolling in about 9:00 and churned up dust in the desert, 
fortunately the wind was blowing the dust away.  Saturday night we feasted on 
pizza. After eating and the sun set is when things got BAD. the ATV's and Dune 
Buggies were back with their million candle power lights, at least 4 on each 
vehicle. There was a very light wind blowing toward us and these A-holes 
stirred up more dust.  They would go out 3-4 miles then turn and drive toward 
us, this went on until after 1:00 Sunday.  I spent the nigh looking at double 
stars and red stars on the SAC list.  Saturday nigh was clear and could have 
been a 7-8/10 night except for the dust.  The Colorado River Astronomy Club is 
more social and very little observing. Next year they will be at a new site!!  
The only good thing about this weekend was I got interested in splitting double 
stars and looking for red stars.

Joe Goss
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