13/10/23 a return to Turfhill(and dark skies) after a few years and a pause for thought.

[Merak]

Hi all,
        My son passed his driving test a few weeks back and had asked me couple of times to go stargazing with him.  The previous couple of times I'd declined because the forecast wasn't great and it would just be a waste of petrol.   Fast forward to Friday night and the forecast was promising - 0% percent cloud cover after 2200 and for once it was right!   

When I say a 'return to Turfhill'  - going back a few years there used to be a South Coast Astronomers Group here on SGL and Turfhill was our meeting point.   For old times sake as well - let's go there! Whilst we're at it, let's start on easier objects too...

The same potholes were evident on the access road  in to the parking but the skies... Flippin' eck!    Seeing the Milky Way in all its glory put a smile on my face and to be honest I got somewhat lost in all the stars.     I did bring a scope with me, I'd be foolish not to!  So we had a look a look at Jupiter then Saturn and a quick look at Uranus but the real 'wow' moment was looking at the double cluster.   It was like looking at a swarm of stars filling the eyepiece - even this invoked a 'wow' from my son, for me it was the best view ever of the double cluster. 

Seeing M31 and the companion galaxies was nice too.    Astrohopper did make it easy to see things but even then I lost track of the open clusters observed because there were quite a few!   I must make an attempt in future to log them all in future....

As for the pause for thought, I went out for a walk earlier and it was extremely sobering to see how a 20 minute drive can make that much of a difference to what can be seen in the sky here.   At the moment I don't have a car but this may change......

 

Edited October 14, 2023 by Merak

[AdeKing]

9 hours ago, Merak said:

the real 'wow' moment was looking at the double cluster.   It was like looking at a swarm of stars filling the eyepiece - even this invoked a 'wow' from my son, for me it was the best view ever of the double cluster

I had exactly the same wow moment last night too and not all that far from Turf Hill. I went out on Cranborne Chase with a few clubmates, the first real outing for me after a bit of a break from astronomy due to one thing and another.

I  sent the mount to the double cluster, took a look and then had to move away from the double cluster and back again to check I was looking at the whole object and not just one half of the cluster. Deep down I knew that I was as the scope and EP combination gave me a 3.1 degree FOV, but the two separate clusters that I can normally see from beneath the BCP Light dome showed up with very little separating them, that was a big wow moment for me and definite motivation to get out more.

Ade

[Stu]

5 hours ago, AdeKing said:

I had exactly the same wow moment last night too and not all that far from Turf Hill. I went out on Cranborne Chase with a few clubmates, the first real outing for me after a bit of a break from astronomy due to one thing and another.

I  sent the mount to the double cluster, took a look and then had to move away from the double cluster and back again to check I was looking at the whole object and not just one half of the cluster. Deep down I knew that I was as the scope and EP combination gave me a 3.1 degree FOV, but the two separate clusters that I can normally see from beneath the BCP Light dome showed up with very little separating them, that was a big wow moment for me and definite motivation to get out more.

Ade

Sounds fab Ade, and good to see you posting again 👍

[Merak]

12 hours ago, AdeKing said:

I had exactly the same wow moment last night too and not all that far from Turf Hill. I went out on Cranborne Chase with a few clubmates, the first real outing for me after a bit of a break from astronomy due to one thing and another.

I  sent the mount to the double cluster, took a look and then had to move away from the double cluster and back again to check I was looking at the whole object and not just one half of the cluster. Deep down I knew that I was as the scope and EP combination gave me a 3.1 degree FOV, but the two separate clusters that I can normally see from beneath the BCP Light dome showed up with very little separating them, that was a big wow moment for me and definite motivation to get out more.

Ade

Going back a fair few years I had a little drive around Cranborne Chase - nice area.   

According to the calculator, my combo was a 2.33 deg fov so probably didn't fit it all in but it was good enough view for me.       Amazing how that short drive shows an astronomical distance in what can  been seen versus here in town.

[AdeKing]

On 15/10/2023 at 16:08, Stu said:

Sounds fab Ade, and good to see you posting again 👍

Thanks @Stu yes I'm hoping that the astro mojo is coming back again.

On 15/10/2023 at 23:06, Merak said:

Going back a fair few years I had a little drive around Cranborne Chase - nice area.   

According to the calculator, my combo was a 2.33 deg fov so probably didn't fit it all in but it was good enough view for me.       Amazing how that short drive shows an astronomical distance in what can  been seen versus here in town.

Absolutely, the sky is wonderful, it's nice to have a dark sky reserve nearby and it's lovely during the day as well.

Edited October 21, 2023 by AdeKing
Spelling

[PeterStudz]

Sounds fantastic and a great write up. I’m in Southampton, my daughter also interested in astronomy. Only been out to the New Forest once with binoculars and been looking for suitable sites to try and take a telescope. Turfhill sounds a good spot and I’ll look into it.