[AZ-Observing] Observing from Vekol

From: Andrew Cooper <acooper@xxxxxxxxx>
To: AZ-Observing <az-observing@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>, TAAA Forum <taaaforum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Sun, 05 Jun 2005 16:15:24 -0700
Enjoyed a night at Vekol last night.  Abouth 20 vehicles and scopes were 
present, many people remarking on the large turnout.  Mostly Phoenix 
guys but a few from Tucson as well, including Dean Salman, John Johnson 
and myself.  I was going to go to Las Cienegas, but all of my H400 
objects were going to be in the NW sky in the Ursa Major and Coma 
Bernieces area, right in the Tucson sky glow from Las Cienegas.  I 
needed a different site.  Dean said he was headed to Vekol, so never 
having been there I tagged along.

Spent the first half of the night doing galaxies in Coma, Canes and Ursa 
Major.  Transparency was decent, seeing was poor, maybe a 5 or 6.  It 
was definitelt a night for dim fuzzy watching, not planetary as Saturn 
was a swimming ball and ring, Jupiter not much better for being high in 
the sky. A cool but not cold night, as I observed in short sleeves and 
shorts until after mighnight when a light jacket became necessary.

A few vehicles pulled out around the middle of the night with far too 
much light, generally pissing off the photographers and the deep sky 
guys like myself.  At least loudly announce your intentions of leaving 
to allow the photographers to close shutters!  Better yet, park nearer 
the road and insure your vehicle is pointing in the right direction so 
no reverse lights are needed to pull out!

I stopped doing galaxies after midnight, they were just getting too low 
to appreciate properly and turned my attention to Sag.   Spent the time 
looking for old favorites as well as some new stuff I had never found.

A few highights...

NGC6522 Small, rich, condensed, 3' diameter, just resolved at 175x, very 
nice globular in a very!! rich Milky Way starfield, NGC6528 in the field 
15' to the east.

B90 Very dark, with no stars visible in the darkest center region, fades 
gradually in all directions with the center being about 4' across.

IC4634 Very small! stellar at less than 200x, at 260x a small disk 
appears, much brighter at the center, slightly green in color, not 
certain about the central star.

NGC6822  (Barnard's Galaxy) Large, faint, easy in the 18", an oval patch 
of soft light, no core, no structure, extended 2:1 north-south, thich 
starfield.

NGC6818 Small blue disk, even and featureless, maybe a little darker at 
the center, about 30" in diameter, no central star visible.

Last object before breaking down was Mars, seeing poor, but could still 
see a polar cap as well as some albedo darkening.

While breaking down a very old moon came over the horizon, a thin sliver 
of light in the bright Sunrise glow.  28d3h old, the moon was only 2% 
illuminated and a beautiful sight in binoculars.  Then it was time to 
drive back to Tucson and bed...

Andrew

-- 
Andrew Cooper
----------------------------------------------------
http://www.siowl.com



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[AZ-Observing] Observing from Vekol

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