KerryAnn invited a few members of the HAA over to observe from her driveway – unfortunately for most they had prior obligations to attend an HAA council meeting and missed out on the opportunity 🙁

Although KerryAnn’s place is very close to the bright Grimsby city lights – it’s high up on the escarpment and well above the majority of the light pollution – it’s not Binbrook, but it is a very nice alternative site. The viewing wasn’t the best last night – with high humidity/haze and the occasional cloud floating over – but even so, we were able to make out some very faint objects – and Saturn presented excellent views in both Kerry’s 6″ SCT and my 80mm APO. When I setup my equipment I could see my breath and gave KerryAnn’s 6″ corrector about 45 minutes before dew would hit (she doesn’t have a dew shield yet) – I was wrong – it wasn’t until near the end of a 3 hour observing session that dew struck.

I had originally planned on imaging the Pleiades, but with the moon only a few degrees away I decided to go for the Rosetta (or Rosette) Nebula instead. KerryAnn tried her hand at imaging M1, the Crab Nebula, but due to lack of a guide scope she was limited to very short exposures.

After about 3 hours the temperature dropped and the clouds rolled in – so we decided to pack up.

The Rosetta Nebula (click on Title link for larger image)
imaged by Tim Harpur March 22, 2007

Canon Digital Rebel XTi mounted prime focus with UHC/LPR filter on
Celestron Onyx 80mm EDF refractor
manually guided
3 x 10 minutes @ ISO1600 stacked