Viking Ship nebula and more...

[BGazing]

Now you are perhaps all wondering what the Viking Ship nebula is, but I'll come to that.

Anyway, had four great consecutive nights of observing in Greece, national park Tzoumerka (details of the place posted in the astro holidays topic), moon was 83 percent and waning, but due to heavy humidity I was limited to a couple of hours per night of effective observation. SQM-L readings varied, with the highest being on the first night just before the moonrise (21.45) and slightly less on later nights (but basically never less than 21.30 once the astronomical dark sets in and there are no clouds around). Milky way showed structure, and a lot of M objects were naked eye, even low on the horizon. It was very moist, the worst being the last nigth when after 2 and a half hours of observing the top of my dewshield was positively soaking wet and dripping, and so was my photo bag.

Jet stream was moderate on the first night and very strong thereafter.

Equipment - new Evo to play with, and host's old dob which had a bad finderscope and focuser and we were limited to using my only 1.25 ep in it (es 24 68mm).

Audience...occassionally alone and often quite a few kids and guests waiting to see something. So observing/outreach combo.

Now I can go through a laundry list of the things observed, but it came to this. With planets low and jestream strong, I gave up on them and went all in on the stuff I miss in the LP areas...nebulas and the like. There were quite a few trees obstructing the view, and some LP from the village up north, so I planned with a compass and SS5 to figure out what position to use in order to maximize the number of desirable objects, which left most of the southern view and almost the entire E and SE unobstructed.

M22, M8, Swan, Triffid, M10, M12, Veil, M13, M11, Saturn nebula, M27,  M71, to name a few...

It is said that under the jet stream DSOs are easier. I'd say that it still affects them to a degree, as it blurs fine filaments which are brought out in the nebulae with the use of the filters. M27 was super bright without filter, stood out well with it, but was a bit fuzzier than I expected, probably due to the jet stream. M8 and M17 were less affected by this and gave glorious views, especially when using DGM NPB filter...it simply rocks.

I used Hyperion 31 mm with Evo 8. Thanks to @YKSE calculations, with the Baader clicklock diagonal in place it works out at around 71x and f/10.95, so exit pupil of about 2.8. Just as he told me, the EP worked out really well and is a great compliment to the scope. I compared it with the 5mm exit pupil when using the 10 inch dob and - with or without filter, and under the skies which are not super dark, but fairly dark, i preferred the smaller exit pupil. 31mm took DGM NPB filter really well...again, as it should, as UHC filters work best with exit pupils of 2mm and up, but struggled with OIII on Veil as the preferred minimum there is 3mm, and I just wish I had a 40mm Paragon with me there and then...oh well. OIII gave me my first look of the Easter Veil (WOW) on the best, very first night, but could not bring out the western part properly. DGM coud bring out the western bit, but with much less detail than the OIII.

It was interesting and glorious to observe what the added aperture (compared to mak 127) and darker skies bring. Of course, more light gathered, more resolution (especially on globulars, which resolved beautfully) and the skies...they just open up. So much stars as a background, even with the filters on, a combined effect of aperture and darkness. It was magical.

If I had to pick a star object of all the four nights, it was M17. Back on Corfu, under LP, I would plop DGM and see it floating on a relatively soupy background pretty much devoid of stars. In Tzoumerka, without the filter it was brilliant, a star shining in the eye and core of the nebula bright (missus prefers the unfiltered look) and with the DGM NPB the entire loop revealed...everyone uh-ed and oh-ed. Asked me why it is also called Omega and Horseshoe (I had no good explanation because to me it always looked like a swan). But then my kid looked (8 yo) and said..."It's not a swan, it's a Viking ship."

And he was right. Swans have longer necks, this IS a Viking ship. Or at least that is what M17 will always be after that night...

 

[Special K]

Great report!  Sounds like a fantastic location too. 

[BGazing]

yeah, great location, with two caveats.

first, it can get humid.

second, not the best spot for astrophotographers, seems to be an air traffic corridor of sorts - a lot of airplanes visible in the night sky day after day.