Hi all
A quick note about a short observing session with a 120mm f/8 achro refractor..
I started out on Venus, pushing the magnification to x91, the gibbous phase was evident, so was a lot of false colour.
Moving onto the moon, I was observing around Copernicus and the Montes Carpatus. Copernicus was magnificent and at x91, I was able to see the central peaks and the terraced west walls. The rim of the crater's shadow was creeping across the floor.
I noticed a bright spot on the dark side not far from Lambert, this was the sun catching the tip of Mons La Hire. I watched it for some minutes as it grew brighter as the sun illuminated more of the mountain. Nearby Dorsum Zirkel was streaming from the night side to the day side like a flowing river.
Mare Imbrium has so many isolated peaks that they stand out beautifully in the rising sun with their shadows slipping like darts onto the Imbrium floor.
I tried to find craterlets in Plato using my highest magnification, x208, but they eluded me.
At the north pole, the craters Peary, Byrd and Gioja were seen, though they were very oblique.
Running up and down the terminator allowed me to see the way the shadows of differing features appear as they cross a crater floor or sea floor. It is one of the things that I really enjoy about lunar observing, the shadows. It gives you an opportunity to gauge what the edge of the crater rim might appear if you were looking at it from the lunar surface. Observe for long enough and they change rapidly and give differing views.
The wind played havoc with the scope and moved it to and fro, it was also cold, so I went back inside.
Paul
Programming today is a race between software engineers striving to build bigger and better programs, and the universe trying to produce bigger and better idiots. So far, the universe is winning.
Rich Cook
