Mini Reports: Dark sky getaway 8th (Mount Pinos) and 15th of September (Solstice Canyon, Malibu)2012

I am going to lump two reports into one post so bear with me. It has been about a month since my last dark sky visit due to my recent trip home to Malaysia/Singapore. I did do some stargazing while I was back there with my trusty Celestron Cometron CO40 and my nephews Celestron Powerseeker 127mm OTA on photo tripod. Seeing how we just collected our new Mazda5 minivan, I decided it was time to give my 10" some dark sky time. It has been more than 2 years since this scope has seen ancient DSO starlight. In fact in the 2 years or so I have been in LA, the scope has only been out twice under indifferent light polluted skies. Needless to say I was itching to let my 10" stretch its DSO chops once again. So after taking three trips down two flights of stairs, the 10" was ready to make its pilgrimage to Mount Pinos. The targets.......the centre of our milky way, as well as some northern skies goodies it has never had the opportunity to catch. Terry my observing buddy came with me on this trip. He had with him a new set of observing gear. Gone is the SkyScanner and Manfrotto tripod. In its place a spanking new Orion StarBlast 4.5" on Vixen MiniPorta. He purchased a Orion StarBlast 4.5 EQ. We left pretty late as I went factory outlet shopping that very day. Since it was late, we decided to just find a spot somewhere along the way up to Pinos (closer to Lockwood Valley). One advantage of this site was the unobscured southern sky, allowing up full view of the southern sky goodies. We arrived at that site just after 10pm. The centre of our home galaxy was still visible, so after unloading the scopes (I had with me my trusty 10" GS dob, and my cute blue tubed 60mm 80's Meade refractor (Its second Pinos run).

First up nebulae M8, M20, M17, M16. All were awesome in the 10" with my 24.5mm Meade SWA with DGM NPB filter despite their lower elevation. I could not frame both M8, the lagoon and M20, the trifid in the same filed of view. Using my lowest mag ep, a 24.5mm SWA Meade, I could only manage 51x, the downside of a larger scope with a longer focal length. M8 appeared mottled, with its nebulosity punctuated by dark nebulae and the lagoon lane stood out boldly. M20, the trifid showed its dark lanes easily. I then perused globular alley, starting with the grand daddy of the Sagittarius clusters, M22, then moved onto M28, M55 and M54, M70, M69. After scrutinizing what Sagittarius had to offer, both at low mag and at higher mag, I moved onto Scutum and its riches, focusing particularly on M11, the wild duck cluster. I then turned my attention on some of the other summer wonders such as M57, the ring nebula, M27, the dumbbell nebula, North American Nebula and Veil Nebula. Then it hit me....I really really miss my 10". The Veil was as intricate as a photograph, showing braided structure with the 24.5mm eyepiece and the DGM NPB filter. The North American and Pelican were viewed in portions due to the longer focal length of the dob, but was nevertheless detailed. I also looked at some other objects that I had not looked at in recent times such as M2 and NGC 7009 (Saturn Nebula) in Aquarius and NGC 7662 in Andromeda. Now this is where aperture starts to make its presence felt. I could push the magnification wayyyy up to between 200 and 400x (my max magnification in this scope with the 6mm Radian and Orion Shorty Plus 2x barlow) without light loss. Internal detail was abundantly obvious in these smaller planetary nebulae. I also looked at the little dumbbell (M76) for the first time with so much aperture. Even M57 showed more (variation in intensity in the ring) and M27 too on a football appearance with the "hollow" areas filling out with nebulosity. I love planetary nebulae!!!! They are just so fun to look at if you have sufficient aperture to make them look different.....

Other objects viewed that night include M31 and its companions (also could not fit this in the FOV so I had to pan around), M33, the double cluster in Perseus and two new objects Terry pointed out in Cepheus, NGC 6946 (galaxy) and NGC 6939 (open cluster). Did my first sketch in ages! Now I am raring to sketch even more objects! Final objects of the night include M45 (the Pleiades), M42 (the Orion Nebula) and good old Jupiter. It was a great night all in all. My only gripe was that they closed the 405 freeway on my home stretch and we had to take a detour...sheesh!!!!!

Malibu run

Okie this is going to be ultra short since I basically looked at similar stuff, just with less aperture. I had with me my C6 6" f/5 newt on Vixen Porta Mount. I just had to get out there, and seeing how it was the new moon weekend (yup I jumped the gun with Pinos and went there during the last quarter moon that rose pretty late at about 1.30am). Also Malibu has not had the best weather for stargazing in months (last trip there was in May!!!!!!!!!), thanks to the marine layer. The only new DSO's I looked at included Sculptor galaxies NGC 55 and NGC 253. These two were my staple galaxy diet from down under. Both appeared a pale reflection of their former glories. With their lower elevation this was expected. Still its nice to know that I still have access to some of my fave southern sky friends. Not much detail in these. Will have to check them out when I go to Pinos this weekend with my 10", weather permitting of course. So yes here is my report...up next Pinos take four for this year.....and a scope review of my all new Celestron/ Costco 102 NexStar GT....an amazing scope for the price!!! Stay tuned!!!!!