SGL4 - observing report

[M110]

Well i stayed from Friday evening to Sunday morning and took the 12" dob with me.

Friday night was not ideal with lots of thick high cloud around blotting everything out. However did manage the odd peak at Saturn through both my scope and Rob's massive 14" LX200 (how he ever fitted it and everything else in his camper van i'll never know!) 4 moons easily visible along with distinct banding on the planet itself.

Saturday night was an altogether different story - only some very broken cloud around which all disappeared later. Again began on Saturn with the dob - at 250x magnification 5 moons were visible along with the shadow of the rings and banding on the planet itself - very good seeing conditions. Next went DSO hunting - Leo triplet, M13, M3, Black Eye Galaxy ... the list goes on. All exceptional although the best by far was The Whirlpool M51 which through John's Ethos (a big thanks for letting me use that, and the Naglers, by the way) was simply stunning. Spiral arms clearly visible along with the bridge to the satellite bit. Next me, John and Andrew tracked down the supernova in NGC 4088 using John's 22mm Nagler it didn't even need averted vision (which at magnitude 13.5 is not small achievement!). Several more objects including; The Dumbell Nebula, The Veil Nebula (which with a UHC filter was simply amazing). Called it a night at just after 2:30am after one last view - M4 which at -26 declination is the most 'southerly' object i think any of us 3 had seen.

An amazing night and a truly memorable weekend

And finally a big thanks to Neil and Claire for the tea, munchies and company throughout the weekend.

See you all next year!

Alex

[John]

Great report Alex - I really enjoyed that session - thanks for letting me use such a well collimated and nicely performing scope - it was a wonderfull night !.

I'm glad you kept a note of what we saw - I kind of lost count after a while !

Regards,

John

[Andrew*]

Thanks for sharing your scope on both nights, Alex,

I was very impressed with its performance and I saw some fantastic sights.

That supernova was something else:headbang:

Andrew

[Dean]

Thanks Alex and john for the grest views through your scopes on the saturday, had a look last night at M51 through my 12" at home and not a touch on the views we had at SGL4.

Dean