Farrington Observing

I arrived a few minutes before 6pm and started setting up on soggy ground. There was a smattering of clouds, but it soon began to clear. Mark South, Robert Nielsen, and Kumar Pandya attended. Kumar actually just slowed down and pointed his telescope out the car window for a few seconds, setting a world record for the shortest observing session away from one's own residence.

Overall, the evening was quite clear, save about an hour. From about 9:30-10:30, the sky was completely clouded over. It got quite cold. Frost was accumulating by 9pm.

The list:

Venus- not quite half lit.
Moon- incredible. The air was very still, which is a treat especially so early in the evening. Long shadows on the surface made for great contrast and stunning terrain.
Andromeda Galaxy- very nice, but a bit of a let-down after the "religious experience" at MASP, as someone called it.
Orion Nebula- 6 stars in the trapezium easily visible, and lots of detail in the nebula.
Flame Nebula- barely visible with either UHC or OIII filter.
Triangulum Galaxy, M33- core and surrounding fuzziness, but no real structure.
NGC 604- a small companion to M33, with a brighter core than M33. (Robert, Mark, and Kumar- this is the smudge I saw below M33. Check this link out for details)
NGC 1360- Nice nebula with a fairly large disk of even brightness, but impossible to see without a filter (in this case, UHC).
NGC 2362- Nice open cluster with a small nebula around the bright central star. Beautiful!
M46- Gorgeous open cluster with a small ring-shaped nebula superimposed. Stunning, especially at 200x!
M36, 37, and 38
NGC 1907
Rosetta Nebula/ NGC 2244- Average open cluster, but a very nice ring of faint nebulosity around it. A UHC filter made it possible to see the nebula at all, but an OIII really brought out some detail. Even still, quite a bit of it was missing.
Crab Nebula- initially almost no detail. UHC filter brought out maybe 5%, and then an OIII about 20%.
Owl Nebula- Hindered by light pollution, but nice at 200x with an OIII filter. I could see the dumbell-shaped dark area in the center quite clearly.
M108- Bright edge-on galaxy with a relatively long body. This was in major light pollution, but held up well.
M109- Face-on galaxy with only the core visible.

I departed shortly before 1am. My new dew prevention system worked beautifully! (Dewbuster with home-made heating strips for finder and eyepiece, plus a secondary heater that finally has power). After over 6 hours of use, my 33Ah battery was still at 85%! I noticed that the heat put off by the eyepiece strap also warmed my nose while looking through the eyepiece.