Another fine day , very similar to yesterday. No clouds, no wind and there was considerably less horizon haze than yesterday too, giving the feeling of an even better night ahead.
A night started to close in the conditions kept looking more promising every passing minute.
I went to Bragan and waited in Clogher to meet up with fellow club members and then we all left for the observing site.
Upon arrival the sky was beautiful with any high altitude haze evaporating quickly and later in the night the horizon haze made a hasty retreat to the lower ground as fog.
The seeing conditions for the first half of the night - before the moon rise - were excellent and the transparency was very good too but as the moon did rise the transparency was reduced by quite a but and seeing started to fluctuate between good and poor.
During the night I got to borrow a 17mm 2" Nagler eyepiece of Neil and I was very impressed with the sharp images I was getting. Thanks to Neil for allowing me to use this and further enhance my night of enjoyment.
There was also good meteor activity. I counted 14 meteorites during the course of the night and also got to see two very impressive fireballs. One that Neil also saw and the other was also seen by Mark.
Location = Bragan
Seeing = 4
Trans = 4 (became less as the moon rose)
Equipment = EQ6 Pro and Orion 10" Newtonian.
Start Time = 21:16
The observations for the night are as follows:
M108 = A lovely view and is has been a very long time since I observed this galaxy. It has a lovely wide disk but detail was average at time of viewing and there was a bright star of our own galaxy places almost center of the M108 giving a pleasing view and giving an extra sense of depth.
M97 = A fine view withe the dark gaps, that make the owls eyes, clearly visible and observing through UHC-S didn't really improve anything so I knew at this point the night was very good.
M109 = Not a great view but with the UHC-S I got to see the nucleus and some scattered structure. One to try again on a night with excellent transparency.
M106 = I got a nice view of this galaxy through the 17mm Nagler. Lovely long elongated disk that appeared to be almost edge on.
M63 = Not much too look at. I've never had much luck observing this galaxy. Even with the UHC-S it just appeared as a smudge with no detail or structure of any kind.
M10 = A beautiful sight, almost filling the FOV in the 8mm. Stars resolving really well from the core right out to the edges.
M12 = Another fine sight. Resolving just as finely as M10 making it a pleasurable observation.
M11 = A stunning view of this cluster. One of my best observations of this. A sea of stars to drift away and get lost in, heavenly...
M26 = My first time seeing this cluster and so pleased I did. A lovely small group of stars that, for me, created the asterism of a candy cane. One to remember.
NGC 6712 - I never looked at this globular before. It was very faint with stars only appearing with AV.
NGC 7331 - Not my best view and eve with mixed magnifications and trying the UHC-S there was no change in detail or contrast. I think it was around this point that the moon had made and appearance on the horizon and conditions started to degrade a little.
NGC 7662 - Very bright and easy to see with good detail under UHC-S. One of my best views for this PN.
NGC 7009 - This was my best veiw I'd had of this PN in years. With out a filter the detail and brightness was excellent, with the small extending globules of nebulous matter extending from either side of the PN seen well with AV and under UHC-S the contrast and detail improved a bit allowing for a higher magnification view. My highlight of the night.
NGC 6946 - This was very faint with only a vague hint of the galaxy at low power.
NGC 7023 - The best view I've ever had with this very tricky reflection nebula. My UHC-S helped a great deal in cutting down the brightness of the central star, allowing me to see the surrounding nebulous cloud with AV, even some hints of structure was visible from time to time.
M2 - A decent view with stars resolving quite well but overall looking faint due to the moon being higher in the sky at this point.
M72 - Very faint and difficult to see with only a hint of stars using AV.
M73 - I never looked at this open cluster before and I now knew why I never bothered to. Very disappointing with just a hand full of faint stars.
Caldwell 19 - The stars around the nebula could be seen well but I got not hint of any nebulosity, even when filtered.
E2816 Cepheus - A stunning triple system that I bumped into while having a failed attempt at observing IC1396. It's a fine sight under any magnification above 50x
Finish - 03:48
It was a very memorible and enjoyable night for me. Neil and Mark left just after 01:00 but Stevie and I stayed on for a few hours more and left just after 04:00.
I really appreciate them travelling down all this way to observe at this site and I hope they enjoyed the night as much as I did and that we will get to observe again soon.
Today is another fine day so I am looking forward to getting out again tonight.
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