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Impressions of Hardraw, December 05 - 07, 2008 ...
Heading North on Friday afternoon the rain soon turned to snow ...
Malcolm had cleared a bit of snow from the car park but things were still slippery at Harris House. When fish-n-chips time arrived five of us piled into Malcolm's car, and then got out of it after he had backed it into the gate post (his mechanic will soon kiss it better). It was not like the previous trip where we had 18 people at the dinner table. There were only seven in the chip shop. But we were rewarded by two clear nights!
The sky did not clear until after the Moon had set. With a dark sky to play with I got my camera attached to my 80mm Scopos refractor to get a few shots. Well wrapped up against the bitter cold I then put my 6 inch Maksutov to use. Despite its long focal length it was surprisingly good at revealing the fuzzies. But it really got into its stride when Saturn came up. The rings are almost edge on now and it looks like an onion on a cocktail stick. The seeing was not great but it was good just to see it again.
After rising late on Saturday morning I had a look through Roy's Solarscope. There were no sunspots but there was a filament that turned into a prominence as it looped around the edge of the solar disk. In the afternoon I went out with my camera to get a few shots of Hardraw in the snow. A proper winter wonderland! As the sun set the cliff behind Harris house turned pink. Then the belt-of-Venus, the Earths shadow, rose as the Sun sank lower.
On Saturday evening there was a pass of the ISS. I was the last to see it and I didn't get my camera anywhere near it but I could not believe how bright it was. I trained my Maksutov at Jupiter and Venus but I was disappointed by what I saw. They were both shimmering and shaking. I thought that the Maksutov needed a bit of time to cool down but the seeing got worse rather than better.
The Moon was the next thing that grabbed our attention. We don't usually get to see it there. The sky did not get very dark until it had set. After a long Friday night observing session and a big Saturday dinner there was not the same rush to go out into the cold on Saturday night, but I decided to give it a go with my binoculars. And this was my highlight of the weekend.
I walked down the road to get away from the lights in Hardraw and let my eyes become fully adjusted to the dark. What a sight! I could see the Milky Way stretch almost from horizon to horizon. When I looked at M31 through the bins it filled the view and I could see the faint outer part you can normally only see in long exposure photographs. The Orion nebular was very bright and the beehive looked great as well.
A good end to another successful weekends dark sky watching..
Christopher Hill
Click on an image to see a larger version.
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 The night sky awaits you ...
If you have not visited our Society before, why not come along?
If you've ever looked up at the starry night sky and been enthralled by what you've seen, we'll be more than happy to show you more and help you understand its beauty ...
Clear skies to all!
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