The Back Bay Amateur Astronomy club holds a monthly event called Skywatch at the Northwest River Park in southern Chesapeake. Sandy and I have been out there before to just look but this is the first time I have taken my own scope.

I have been trying to learn to better navigate the sky without using the GOTO computers on my CG5 mounts. I don’t have my mobile power worked out yet anyway so I figured this would be a good opportunity to do some star hopping using just a Skymap and a red dot finder. If I got totally lost or was not able to view anything there would be others there to help me get back on track or if I got totally frustrated with it there would be a number of other scopes to look through.

Sandy, Mary Shannon, and I loaded up the Xterra with the SV80BV, the M1 mount, a cooler with a few bottles of water, a couple of camp chairs, and the bug repellent. We arrived at the observing site in the equestrian area of NWR park at about 8:00 PM and set up. I have one cigarette lighter plug in the cargo area of the Xterra so I used that to power the dew heater controller.

I got everything set up and we waited for the sun to go down. Venus and Saturn were the first targets visible well before the sky was even dark. After that I started searching out globular clusters.

We had a really good time. I did not take a count but I would guess there were between 10 and 15 scopes set up – ranging in size from my 80mm refractor to Kent’s monster 25″ dob (the views of M13 through that thing are INCREDIBLE). I learned a lot about navigating the sky. Mary Shannon had a great time learning about the different constellations and stars. Both Mary Shannon and Sandy enjoyed looking through Ted’s 18″ Dobsonian that was set up next to us.

The Skywatch event is open to the public and if you get a chance you should check one out – the schedule is here. We are already looking forward to the next one.

From my observing notes:

Venus was very easy to spot well before dark. Though the scope you could easily see the phase of the planet using both the 22mm and the 9mm eye pieces. The phase is very similar to the gibbious moon phase (somewhere between the quarter phase and gibbious phase) I am not sure if it is waxing or waning. Because of the brightness it was actually hard to observe this as the sky became darker.

Saturn was beautiful as always. The shadow of the rings across the planets surface was very easy to resolve. It was approximately 9:10 PM when we were viewing it so the sky was not yet completely dark. I was only able to resolve the moon Titan.

Below are my two quick sketches I made in my log book of the phase of Venus and the location of Saturn’s moon Titan.

A BBAA member walked by (sorry I do not remember who) and said that Albireo would look good through my scope. He showed me where to look, and he was right. Albireo is a double star, it is the head of the constellation Cygnus. The double contains one larger blue star and a smaller gold/yellow star.

Messier 4 (M4) Very faint but it was easy to find by centering on Antares and slowly moving the scope to the west using the 22mm. The 9mm brought out more detail of the bright core and was able to resolve individual stars around the core.

Messier 80 (M80) Was also fairly easy to find by centering on Antares and slowly moving the scope up to about half way between Antares and Acrab (Beta Scorpii) in constellation Scorpius. It has a bright core, but I could not resolve individual stars to the core. Also tried with the 7mm Nagler.

Messier 57 (M57), the Ring Nebula, is found in the constellation Lyra about halfway between the stars Sheliak and Sulafat. M57 resolved as a fuzzy bluish thick walled bubble with the 9mm.

Messier 20 (M20), the Trifid Nebula, and Messier 21 (M21), an open cluster. This was one of my favorite targets of the night. Both M20 and M21 could be seen in the same FOV of the 9mm Nagler. I was able to resolve the dark lanes that separate the Trifid Nebula.

Mizar and Alcor is another double found in the handle of the Big Dipper. Mizar is a large blue star and Alcor is a much smaller blue star.

I did not note any specific details about these clusters. Basically a BBAA member (Ted) was calling these off and I was going looking for them. Messier 10 (M10), Messier 11 (M11), Messier 22 (M22), and Messier 15 (M15)

Alignment Stars: Arcturus and Spica
Calibration Stars: Antares, Deneb, and Altair

My observation plan was to observe a few globular clusters. I was looking for targets to possibly image over the weekend. The sky was very clear, I don’t think we have had skies this clear since early spring.

Since I had to get up early the next morning I did not get to spend as much time out as I would have liked. I spent most of the session observing M13 and M92. I also took a quick look at M4, M5, and M80.

From my observing notes:

Messier 13 (M13), the Great Globular Cluster in Hercules, was the first on my list/plan. Was able to see the cluster with the 22mm Panoptic in the C6 and I was able to resolve individual stars on the outer area of the cluster. The heart of the cluster was fuzzy without detail. At 9mm I could resolve individual stars closer to the center of the cluster and the 7mm Nagler showed even greater detail of what appears to be 100s if not thousands of stars.

With the 7mm Nagler in the AT66 the view was similar to the 9mm in the C6. A wider area but good contrast and I was able to see individual stars close to the center of the globular. I tried the 4mm Radian but had a hard time focusing. The scope was pointing nearly straight up which caused the Crayford focuser on the AT66 to slip from the weight of the eye piece – no issued with 7mm Nagler (which is considerably lighter). There is a tension adjustment on the focuser but it requires a small allen wrench and I did not want to fiddle with it in the dark.

Messier 92 (M92) – With the 7mm in the C6 I was able to resolve individual stars. This globular cluster seems much more compact. More stars in a smaller area. Did not take up as much of the FOV in the 7mm eye piece as M13.

I got a quick view of M4, M5, and M80 with the 9mm Nagler and the C6. I did not spend the same amount of time on these that I did on M13 and M92. The one note that I did make about M4 was that it appeared to not contain as many stars as M13 and M92.

I had great views of each of these globulars and I think M4, M5, and M80 will be on my list of targets for imaging this weekend.

Before ending the session I took a quick look at Saturn. The planet was much lower in the sky, near the horizon, so I did not have the same issue with the 4mm Radian slipping in the AT66. I could easily resolve the ring shadow where it crossed the planet. The 4mm in the C6 also allowed me to see some good detail.