With rain in the forecast I discounted doing any observing this week. But while stepping outside last night to take out the garbage I noticed the moon was up with only a thin fog around it -- certainly worth the effort, which is none at all, to set-up and observe. So I quickly opened up the shed and brought Big Blue out from its two week hibernation. I viewed the moon at 310x with binoviewers at first, and the seeing was just barely able to support it. No particular plan, and I didn't even open my atlas; just soaking in the views along the terminator, around Plato (four craters seen with some effort), along the limb with its hills on the horizon. Then I switched to 97x, and followed a similar circular meandering path. This time I was struck by the rays, their variety and greyscale, some in scattered fans, some in bright streaks, some blocked by mountains, and some, especially around Tycho, laying in a thick snow across the landscape.
I thought about how the 20-inch would certainly best Big Blue on such a night, and give me some versatility. If there are a clear few days next week I might set them up side by side and see exactly what the differences are. I feel sad I am contemplating retiring Big Blue, it is such a fine scope and really is a "lifetime" back yard instrument. But better is better. If I could justify this by buying a portable large aperture scope for dark site deep sky work, then it would make the decision easier...
No comments:
Post a Comment