Confusing Night at a Dark Sky Location

[goolosh]

Hello All!!

Some of you may have read one of my previous posts where i went to a "poor mans" dark site a month or so ago and was blown away by the sights! Well i recently went on a trip to a legitimate Dark Sky site! Actually i went to several locations all of which are so far away from urban centers and city lights, they are considered some of the best places for Astronomy in my State.

The first stop was Medicine Lake California, deep inside the Modoc National Forest. I was very excited to see some brilliant stars. The first night there was Sept. 15th which gave me a night free of the Moons annoyance! But i was left beyond disappointed with the sky i saw.

*For the record, i checked beforehand and the nearest Forest Fire was well over 100 miles away at the time. The elevation was 6700 feet, there was not a cloud in the sky all day and night and the temperature was around 30-40 Degrees Fahrenheit at the time of observing.*

I was able to see a decent amount of the milky way with the naked eye, from horizon to horizon basically, and clearly make out some serious dark patches within it. I was also able to spot the Lagoon Nebula with the naked eye along with Andromeda and M103. But despite these things, everything was dull and unimpressive through my scope. I even looked with binoculars in case the telescope was dirty, but the view was the same. I was comparing the views with those i had on a peak closer to home. The views from the non legit Dark Site were mind blowingly fantastic. During that trip i could make out the overall shape of Andromeda through just my binoculars and even more so with the telescope.

So i was bummed to say the least. But mostly i was confused. Why were the views here less impressive? In my earlier trip i could see M13 with the naked eye but couldn't during this trip. On the previous trip i don't recall seeing the Lagoon Nebula with the naked eye, but through a scope it was gigantic and impressive but this trip i could make out its haze in the sky but the views through a scope were no better than what i can see at home in the city lights.

Ok so i thought maybe i was too close to a campfire or the scope was too cold ect. I was on the trip for a camping vacation and the telescope was only one aspect of it, it certainly didn't ruin my trip. I decided to try again when i got to Crater Lake National Park a few days later.

Since this was later in the week, the Moon was present for the first hour of the night but soon it was gone. The sky was roughly the same. Things were similarly unrefined in the scope and binoculars as they were before. And i was annoyed.

Could this difference suggest something is wrong with the telescope?

Could being close to a large body of water have caused too much moisture in the air for good viewing?

Could i have not been properly adjusted for Night Vision?

Maybe there was a haze in the sky i was unable to see or was unaware of?

I was left confused and annoyed. Like i said though since the trip was for more than telescope observing i was not as annoyed as i would have been if that was the sole reason i went out there. But regardless i was expecting the sights to be at the very least on par with the trip to the non legit dark site, or even better. In the end it was kind of a disappointment.

[nmoushon]

You could probably answer yes to all your questions. Except the first one...doubt anything is wrong with your scope. Odds are that since you were near a lake that there was moisture/fog that could've made visual object hazy and cloudy. There also could have been very high thin clouds that you can see but have a noticeable effect on visual objects. Also a possibility is that the atmosphere just didn't want to cooperate that night and gave poor visibility. (That use to be why orbiting telescopes use to produce such better quality images but now with the invention of adaptive optics ground base scopes are getting closer and closer to the quality of orbiting scopes.) If you had a camp fire or a white/yellow light flashlight and used that all the time then yes that could hurt your night vision. If your not using a red light flashlight/head lamp then I would suggest spending $20 and grabbing one. Will do far less damage to your night vision than normal flash lights.

[Capricorn]

No chance of knowing what the conditions were like out in CA, will say that over here we have had a few nights where the sky looked pretty clear but there was a very high very thin cloud.

We could see the constellations, stars, M31 etc and various clusters but the general viewing was subdued.

I can only guess/suggest that you had similar.

I wonder about moisture off of the trees.

Ever seen a forest/wood under infra red, they are "warm" at night when viewed through an IR camera system. I recall a question of Design/construct a mechanism to take water from 100 feet below the ground to 100 feet above the ground and then evaporate it into the atmosphere. Solution is a tree.

I suppose the final option: Simple bad luck.

[Mr Spock]

High thin cloud as mentioned will do it. On the face of it you will see a clear sky with lots of stars, but the last little bit will be obscured. It's what you'd call poor transparency - it happens

[goolosh]

Next time i'll try to get above the tree line