As the time approached for the 2004 Astronomy Weekend, the weather forecast was bleak. The prediction was for rain the entire weekend as Hurricane Ivan approached. Because of the crappy forecast, I called BWF on Wednesday to cancel my reservation and assumed I would miss Astronomy Weekend for two years in a row. But then on Friday, even as Ivan spread rain over our area, the forecast began to look more promising. On Saturday morning, the Clear Sky Clock predicted clear skies from mid afternoon on. So with Hang and Makea's permission, I made a room reservation at the lodge, packed the telescope and other stuff in the car, and headed for BWF.
The attendance was sparse but enthusiastic. Ron Cockeram asked me to join
in his talk on "Choosing a Telescope", so I ended up being a presenter at
the meeting. A new feature (for me, anyway), were sessions on "The Moons of
Jupiter" and "Sketching Planets" presented by Melissa Thorner, an elementary
school teacher. She described two astronomical activities she does with her
school children involving plotting positions of Jupiter's moons and making
sketches based on photos of the moons. I wondered how Makea would do with
the plotting exercise.
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Melissa Thorner showing pictures of Jupiter's moons.
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Becky Littleton helping a little astronomer with her
moon plots.
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Ron Cockeram with his Schmidt-Newtonian
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Ed Conners with a highly modified Bushnell
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After dinner with Jim Alley and his friend Jackie at the brewery, I set my
up my 8-inch with my 80 mm ShortTube riding piggyback in the new Guide Star
mount I got the week before. At the raffle drawing, one of Makea's door prize
tickets won a Swiss Army knife for astronomers. For the star party, I decided
to take photos this year and spend more time looking through other peoples'
scopes. There was no keynote speech this year-the speaker was to have been the
weatherman for one of the Huntington TV stations, but he ended up out covering
the storm and was unable to attend. So I was able to spend more time getting
set up. The sky was very clear (I could actually see all seven stars in the
Little Dipper), but everyone was plagued with dew from the rain-soaked ground.
I took photos of M16 (the Eagle Nebula) and the supernova remnant near Sadr
in Cygnus, but there was dew on the corrector plate of the 8-inch after each
exposure. One of the pictures of M16 turned out to be OK, but the other one
suffered from the dew, and the supernova remnant was so far out of focus that
it's unusable. But at least it gave me another chance to try out the Guide Star.
One new object I saw while my telescope was taking pictures was NGC6207 (near
M13) through an 18-inch computerized Dob.
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My scope with the 80 mm in the Guide Star mount
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Jim and Jackie with their C14
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The 18-inch Dob
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The Eagle Nebula in Scutum
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The falls were impressive after the water dumped by two hurricanes in seven
days, but I could only view them from afar--the boardwalk to the falls is being
renovated. I got Makea a new animal friend and a pair of earrings for Hang and
headed home. I'm looking forward to next year's Astronomy Weekend--I hope all
three of us can come then.
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The Elekala Falls behind the Lodge
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Blackwater Falls seen from the Gentle Trail overlook
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