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Arrived on the hill about 8:00. Joe drove in at the same time. Gene and Bill were already set up and observing when we pulled in. Where in the heck was everyone else???? Really a good night. Seeing was steady and transparency was above average if not excellent. I hadn’t been on the hill in some time, so I dug into some old favorites. M42 was super. In fact I could see at least five stars in the "Trapezium" area, and to tell the truth, I would testify that I could make out a sixth. I can’t recall that I have ever seen that many with my 8". My imagination? From there I checked out the quadruple star just below Alnitak in the belt. Awesome sight that has become one of my favorites. In my scope, the fourth star is just a tiny faint gray ball. Went on to check out the 37 cluster. Doug put me on to that one a couple of years ago. If you haven’t seen it, it is a must. Stayed in the neighborhood and checked out the little triple star that is between Alnitak and Sirius. My book notes it as a "beautiful triple...seen in small scopes". That may be, but it was a stretch separating them out with my 10mm eyepiece (120x). If my recall is correct, two stars were separated by a hair’s width (like to throw in those technical terms for you physics majors) with the third star seeming to touch the middle star. The three formed a little gray ball chain that looked like a small rattlesnake rattle (but with rounder bells). Thought it was cool and well worth the look. Checked out M41 next (always worth a quick look). Saturn was fairly decent. Steady enough to make out several bands. Mars was orange and tiny! It is sure fading quickly. On over to Andromeda. I can never pass on M31. Around 9:15 I noticed that the full sickle of Leo was up in the east. That was exciting to see because I know Virgo and all it treasures will follow close behind. Sad to say, clouds rolled in by 9:30. We sat around and talked until 10:15 but the clouds appeared to be set in for the night, so we packed up and departed. When I got home around 10:45 the sky was clear as a bell!!! GO FIGURE! Don’t know about the others, but I had a great time. An enjoyable night even if it was short!
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