The "clear skies" part says it all!
The Equipment:
Skywatcher EQ3-2 (unpowered) mount
Skywatcher 120/600 Refractor
TeleVue Nagler type VI 9mm & TeleVue Delite 18mm EP's. No Barlow.
Baader Moon filter
Conditions
Bortle 3 ~ 4 skies
Winds 9km/h from the NE
Elevation - 855m above sea level, central west of NSW
Humidity 82%
Temperature 18 degrees C, dropping to 11 degrees by the time I packed up.
Seeing Conditions – Clear cloudless skies (a miracle!) and after a warm day, about II on the Antoniadi scale, improving slightly as the evening went on. Not helped by occasional locals driving on the nearby road with 6 spotlights ablaze on the bulbar and another 8 going across the front of the roof rack…
The ground is still very wet – this is only the second day we’ve had without some rain – so a little extra care was taken just before sunset to level everything.
After threats of a thunderstorm and a few clouds scudding back and forth, the skies cleared as I set up the mount in the late afternoon to give the ‘scope plenty of time to adjust to ambient. As the moon rose, I started out with the 18mm EP and a moon filter, because even as the shadow crept across the face of the moon, ol’ luna was bright! It was interesting to note the difficulty in picking up some usually clear details as the shadow slowly engulfed the surface of the moon.
As totality approached, I switched to the 9mm EP without the filter. The moon was a majestic pinkish red. The Skywatcher 120/600 is known to suffer a little chromatic aberration, and this was slightly more evident without the filter, however it didn’t interfere with the details across the case of the moon. There was very little aberration during totality.
During totality, I was surprised at how some details stood out – for example, the central peak in Theophilius crater near Mare Nectis was surprisingly easy to make out – but other old favourites such as Tycho crater were quite hard to see. The angle of the illumination (or lack thereof) brought out some details that are normally a little hard to spot, and seemed to obscure others that are usually readily visible.
Even with an early start to the day tomorrow, it was a very worthwhile way to spend three hours. Fly me to the moon...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZEcqHA7dbwM
