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A session you dream of


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Completely ridiculous, clear skies every night, keep giggling like a kid with candy. Tuesday night 26th May. Did a load of homework on Stellarium and the star charts (I need both) and I do the usual optimist route. Time will tell.

Set up the EQ5 with the 150 pds in bright sunlight. Not a single cloud and I grab the bins and the dogs and walk to the top of the lane to observe Venus and hopefully for the second time Mercury. Venus against the bright sundown ‘amazing’ quarter illuminated disk, like a distant mimic of the moon.

I had to wait till 23:00hrs till it was dark enough to do any EP work. Sat back in the chair watching space junk tumble and flash across the sky! Would make an amazing AP trail.

First up M13 just to test alignment. I have spent a lot f time on this recently so for me no need to dwell. Next Glob M 92, I prefer this in the EP to M13. Appears to have a tighter brighter core.  It’s outer area seems to do a similar thing to Andromeda. Focus on the core but there seems to be much more.

Heading over to NGC 6210 Turtle Nebula still in Hercules. Should be beyond my mag limit of tenish. Surface brightness made me say “why not”. First look, three stars, nothing else. Hooded up and the lower star is not sharp. More an out of focus blob, with a light blue green colour. Soooo small. First for me! Then a meteor shoots through the fov, amazing.

Into Draco. NGC 5985/ 5981/5982 Draco’s Trio. Absolutely nothing! I have been doing so well but the brightest at mag 12 was going to be a stretch.

M102. I would normally talk about this, but I noticed in the charts a nearby edge on galaxy NGC 5907. Gob smacked, better than 102, I have that ear marked for an AP session.

Into Lyra.  Quite low on my horizon for the time, just after midnight. Would be rude note to look at the Ring Nebula M57. Just want to say that when I do EP sessions I use the voice recorder on my phone. Listening back to record my notes I have the following... Who ever first saw that through a scope must have wondered how there is a polo mint in space.

Completely forgot NGC 6543 The Cats Eye Nebula so back to Draco. Nice Crisp Blue Ball. Larger than Turtle. 
 

Over to Cygnus. So many open clusters! I am sorry to say that I am underwhelmed by OC’s. Getting close to bed time now so a chance at the Eastern Veil. NO CHANCE, way to low to my horizon. If I could only stay out all night. Now to unfinished business. The Blinking Planetary! For a planetary a bit bigger than I was expecting. White in colour, but could not discern any blinking. Must look into that.

Ended with a chancers look at M83 in Hydra. I am 103/110 of Messier’s list. Now 104/110. Very low to the horizon but no averted vision needed. 
 

Wishing you all clear skies and the opportunity that I have just had.
 

Marvin

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On 27/05/2020 at 20:35, Marvin Jenkins said:

The Blinking Planetary! For a planetary a bit bigger than I was expecting. White in colour, but could not discern any blinking. Must look into that

Excellent session!

As Nick says, probably best in smaller apertures, if you use averted vision the Blinking planetary shows it’s full extent, then blinks out into a central star when you look directly at it. It looks quite green to me from memory.

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On 29/05/2020 at 08:13, Stu said:

Excellent session!

As Nick says, probably best in smaller apertures, if you use averted vision the Blinking planetary shows it’s full extent, then blinks out into a central star when you look directly at it. It looks quite green to me from memory.

Thanks Stu, it’s one of those times you get all your wish list written out and very nearly see the lot.

As you have described the blinking, I may have seen it after all and not realised what I was seeing. I looked at it for some time, then tried switching from direct to averted. Noticeable change in brightness but I put that down to flicking from direct to averted and back again. Maybe if I had held at averted I may have seen the change after all.

Marvin

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