Deep Sky Camp - April...

[JohnP]

Hi All,

Just got back from Night down at Tuesnoad. Mike asked me to remind all that there is a charge for the field - it's £5/ person per night... (a bargain at twice the price if you ask me...) OAS  don't get the field for free & owner does want paying...! Please don't forget to pay Mike before you leave - he is there for the whole weekend...

Cheers John. (for Mike).

[Daniel]

Hey guy's, firstly thanks for all the help last night I was great meeting you all, albeit in silhouette, will finally be able to polar align properly next time im out, And sorry for having to take off so early in the morning, we made a terrible mistake with the tog rating on our sleeping bags and were up all night shivering, we did however go for a walk outside the tent in the early hours to try to warm up, the sky cleared and the stars were looking amazing agan, most stars I've ever been under when i've also had the mind to look up, I was almost tempted to get the scope out again!

If it's ok, I'd like to come along to the next meeting, meet you all properly, become a "proper" member and also pay the 15 quid we owe you guy's (for the 3 of us) Oh, and actually meet face to face instead of making out shapes in the dark!

Apart from the near hypothermia, I enjoyed everything else immensely, even though it clouded over before I got to image anything, the sky alone was better than what i tend to see through my scope here!

Anyway, thanks again all, will definetly be coming again although better equipped, before sundown and I'll make sure I pay before everyone goes to bed in case I have to rush off in the morning again!

Thanks

Daniel
:O)

PS when we were walking around at about 3:30 am in the field we could see a huge fuzzy shape in the sky above us towards the road, is this a nebula of some sort, it seemed pretty gigantic?

[JohnP]

Hi Daniel,

It was good meeting you as well. Hope to meet up again at the next meeting. No idea what fuzzy shape was - if you were looking at road from your tent you would have been looking in a south westerly - westerly direction - there are tons of messier objects in that direction at 3.30'ish - could have been a diffuse globular or galaxy - any chance you can check on a planetarium prog.

Cheers, John

[Whitters]

Probably M8, nice big Nebula and cluster. or it may be M4 would be fainter but a big globular cluster.

[Tony G]

Could it have been the 'Beehive Cluster'???????
That was towards the road about that time in the morning.

Tony G

[JohnP]

m44 (beehive) is very low down.. less than 10 deg.... not sure if you could see this low down... John

[Daniel]

Hmmm, I think M8 and M4 would have been too low in the sky, the shape was quite high, the closest i can see would be the cluster of galaxys around pinwheel and black eye, seems like a lot in that neighbourhood and looks about the size that I saw, would any of this be visible to the naked eye?

[Mike]

Nice to meet you and your friends Daniel. Glad you found it useful, even if you neaarly ended up with hyperthermia. Hope to see you at a future meeting, observing or imaging session.