Postcards from Malibu...my X Mas prezzie to myself for X Mas 2013 23rd of December and new years 30th of December 2013

 "NGC 436: ET/Strongman Cluster in Cassiopea"

Okay so this post is a couple of weeks late. Don't know if it was the holidays or something. I did heaps of observing and imaging but for some strange reason did not have the inspiration to put it to paper (or blog ;). I started my prose with this : "X Mas a time of peace, a time of joyous celebrations. Also a time for reflection and family togetherness. I must confess that I have taken many things for granted. I have a beautiful family who loves me and who would stick by me through thick or thin. I have everything I could possibly wish for and more". And that was it. Got stuck is writers hell. Now I am back in work mode and the brain juices seem to be flowing again...

 "NGC 663: Open cluster in Cassiopea"

Anyway X mas and New Years hols have come and gone and I had a wonderfully relaxing holiday with my family. We did all come down with the flu and then bronchitis, which sucked (still recovering from it!) but overall it was a good holiday. We did do some fun stuff like visiting the San Diego Zoo, as well as checking out some playgrounds close to where we live in Culver City (the Marina Del Rey playground is fantastic for kids!!!!). We also caught up on some new movies like Frozen (great Disney flick for kidults!), as well as the Matt Damon flick Elysium (which was great too).

But this particular year end holiday was especially memorable for stargazing, because I got my fill of ancient starlight over the holidays, two shots of Malibu to be precise this holiday season. Once on the eve of the eve of X Mas, and the other on the eve of the eve of the eve (so many eve's) of the new year.  Funny thing though is that I observed from two different spots in Malibu, from our usual Solstice Canyon site, and also on a hill overlooking the Pacific Ocean about a mile up from where our site is (recommended to me by some friendly neighbourhood cops who told me of this site, which has unobstructed views of the southwestern sky...Canopus was easily visible above the horizon). The latter is a popular stopping spot as it has a rather wide dirt patch that you can drive your car right up. Most people there were sightseers, and some curious onlookers.  I ran an imprompto "sidewalk" astronomy session where I showed them Jupiter and his moons, the Orion Nebula, and Pleiades, the Seven Sisters through my Astroscan (on my car bonnet no less).

 "M46 and NGC 2438 Planetary in Puppis"

Got some great imaging and visual observing in too over both the sessions. The only bummer was the strong gale force Santa Ana winds on both nights, which made it very difficult for any imaging (but very pleasant for observing as it was nice and balmy). I managed to sneak a few pics here (Managed to shoot some open clusters in Cassiopea, Puppis and the Flame Nebula in Orion. Tried for the Running Man again as well as the Horsehead but was not successful) and there between gusty conditions on the first session (from Solstice Canyon) on the 23rd of December, but the 30th was a bust (from the bluff overlooking the ocean).  Other than me getting exasperated at not being able to image everything I wanted that was on my "to do" list (missed out on NGC 2903 in Leo, NGC 2359 in Canis Major, as well as some dimmer fare which I am still not sure if they are doable since they are located at pretty southerly declinations NGC 1365 and NGC 1097 in Fornax and NGC 1300 in Eridanus), I had a great time panning around in my Astroscan (great wide field scope by the way, but hard to aim at stuff without a finder, even at low mag), as well as checking out some of the springtime galaxies like NGC 2903 in Leo, M81/82 in Ursa Major, as well as the big bear planetary M97, the Owl Nebula.

 "M47 open cluster in Puppis"

The visual highlights of my session was seeing the Rosette Nebula in the 102GT, as well as NGC 2359 (Thor's Helmet) in Canis Major. Both required the use of a nebula filter ( I used my DGM NPB filter). Rosette was not visible without the filter, while Thor's Helmet. The helmet shape could only be discerned with the filter in place. The latter is an easy object from oz in my 10", and its helmet shape is easily visible even without a filter.

 "NGC 2024: Flame/Tanktracks nebula in Orion"

So all in all I had a great X Mas and NewYear's holiday. I gave myself the best gift an astronomer could get nice, clear and transparent dark skies and my own personal "deep sky postcards", taken during the festive season all by myself.