Observing Notesfrom the Tuckahoe IrregularsI attended the Mason-Dixon Star Party for the first time. Great social event met a lot of people. Observing was not the same as at Tuckahoe. On Saturday we could just about see evidence of the Milky Way. Makes you really appreciate Tuckahoe. Two people who are considering buying and Orion XT 10 came over and I let them use my rig. We were having a lot of fun. A woman who runs an observatory stopped by and she spent both nights with us giving us a lot of hints and taking us on a tour of the sky. She worked with Hank Bouchelle on project Spica. Very informative for all of us. All told their were six people using the scope and trading ideas and stories. It was a great time. The first night was really a dew buster. Used my Kendrick for the first time and it worked fine on my telrad and eyepiece. The seeing wasn't too great that night and about 1:00 am or so clouds rolled in and we called it a night. Saturday night there was a presentation by Phil Harrington the author of "Star Ware". He talked about light pollution and what he and his friends were doing to increase observing time where they live. He mentioned a woman that had logged about 50 Messier objects from the roof of her apartment building in Manhattan. They then held the drawings for various items and by the end the skies were dark enough to start observing. A&E was at the site filming a documentary for the 25th anniversary of Voyager. They were lighting up some areas of the field until about 10:00 PM doing interviews. Finally they finished and we were able to get on with observing. This site needs some discipline regarding white light. All during Saturday night people were turning on white lights. The parking area up front was within view and we could see the headlights of people leaving. Must set up further down the hill next time. Also it seems a shame that people have so little respect for others. They need to take care of their dome lights and buy some red flash lights. The only other problem was headlights that come on as running lights on new vehicles. There is a way of turning them off but it takes a little trial and error and people needed to practice this before they came on site. Many did not know that putting the emergency break down a notch or two will cut off the running lights. I would think that they would pay attention to this but no it seems they felt it was all right to drive with their headlights on and blind the people in the upper most rows. I will be sending the YCAS people a note about this. Howie Glatter attended this and it was good to meet him and talk to him about his collimating products. All in all it was pretty good and the YCAS did a pretty good job of organizing it. Well, next up is Cherry Springs, a really dark site in September as I recall. |