Bad timing

[Eastman]

I had it all figured out, a nice weekend in Germany at the Mosel region.

Moon rise late at night, dark skies, great view over the region on top of mont Royal. After the check in I rushed into the back yard. Great open space with the main view at the East. The weather report seemed pretty oke. Soon it became dark and I went outside wth my SW130p flextube. Nice band of stars forming the milkyway. I enjoyed it while the scope cooled down. Double cluster and M31 where naked eye objects. And lower at the horizon I can see M45. I really enjoying this view of the East part of the sky, it's completly blocked by trees at home in my garden.

First up NGC 884 /869 the double cluster, great views lot of stars visible and really nice yellow colours forming the center of both clusters.

M31 Now this is a much bigger object in the eyepiece under a dark sky. I thought I saw some cloud structure,is this possible at 20X magification?

M45 and then fhe lights fade away, clouds came in form the West, set the alarm several times at night but the skies never opend up again that night.

Next day I went to Trier a beautiful city with lots of historical sites, while the sky darkend it looked very promising. The whole sky clear of any clouds or haze as you can see at the picture.

Almost back at the holiday park we drove into a big cloud, it stayed the rest of the two remaining days, sure bad luck but the Mosel region is a great area for site seeing and make nice long walks. The astro weekend ended with 3 objects, but it was the best M31 ever.

 

greets Gert

 

[Star101]

1 out of 3 is not too bad. 

Nice photo too.

Pity the clouds rolled in but at least  you had a taster.

Nice report too

[VNA]

Beautiful image of the church, but clouds are capricious!
I wish we had clouds and rain!

[Stu]

Yep, at least you had some clear skies.

It's amazing how large m31 appears under a dark skies with a wide field of view. Did you catch M32 and M110?

Nice report.

[Eastman]

9 minutes ago, Stu said:

Did you catch M32 and M110?

Sure did Stu, especially M110 jumped out really well.

[alan potts]

I always prefer M31 on low power, in fact I maybe even prefer it through my 10.5x 70 bins.

Alan

[Stu]

1 hour ago, alan potts said:

I always prefer M31 on low power, in fact I maybe even prefer it through my 10.5x 70 bins.

Alan

It's great in the Genesis with 30mm eyepiece Alan, nearing 5 degree field of view