Perseid Shower? ... Sort of.

We had a nice Saturday night on the hill (August 11), though not exactly meeting my high expectations. First off, a beautifully clear morning sky turned in to a cumulus sky in the afternoon, and nightfall brought in some billowing anvils. When they cleared, we could see over-the-horizon lightning way off to the south. The murk over the Ct. River Valley never did clear out, though the Milky Way was vivid overhead by 10 PM.

The meteor rate never surpassed a rate of one every five minutes, though we did see a couple of blazers that left short lived trails.

Rich Volant and Ray Burk provided the entertainment, giving newcomers Mike and Shar from Florence, MA, lots of astronomy facts, cosmology musings, and their overall views of life, the universe, and anything else they could think of. Rich and his "Go TO" setup gave Mike and Shar a wonderful tour of the Summer Sky highlights.

Claudio had his home made refractor set up near the clubhouse, and another car or two joined us on the hill, though I never did figure out who was there.

Rich and I "almost" had the 24" collimated, it delivered "OK" views once I had the TelRad aligned and could find things. The Gaertner did its usual wonderful job on Jupiter, and we got to watch Io hide behind the gas giant.

My son Tyler enjoyed "touring the Milky Way", and counted over 20 satellites before fatiuge and cold (50?) drove him in for a while.

By morning the dew was heavy on the tent, and some clouds were moving in.