Observing with Street Lights

Observing with Street Lights
Dark sky sites not always necessary to see the Milky Way (This image was taken ouside of a B&B in Julian, CA)

Saturday, August 29, 2015

Planning for AIAA conference in Pasadena, Planning for Eclipse 2017, and Sun Dog seen in Julian?

Greetings from Palmia Observatory,

Well, no deep space observing this week, what with the moon full tonight.  The moon light and perhaps a werewolf or two will not go well.  So, I'm getting ready to go to Pasadena Convention Center next week for the AIAA Space 2015 conference.  About a 1,000 participants will spend 3 days hearing from 350 presenters, plenary session speakers and exhibit hall discussions covering all

Tuesday, August 18, 2015

Julian Star Party, Menghini Winery, Orchard Inn B&B, Double Star Albireo and Epsilon Lyrae and Mizar, Visible Milky Way, Mt. Laguna AFB,

Well this week we were offsite at the Star Festival in Julian.  Astronomer assistant Danny was sent to vacation with Bob in Costa Mesa.  Resident astronomer Peggy concentrated on doing binocular observation and tried using my camera tripod with tilt/pan head to support the weight of the binoculars.  Resident astronomer George tried to build on his success in alignment and last week of observing globular clusters by aligning successfully once again and observing

Sunday, August 9, 2015

Fun in Julian at Julian Star Festival and first images M4, M7, M22, NGC457, and M13 and even possibly Neptune?

Greetings from Palmia Observatory

This week has finally culminated in some observing success and photos after finally getting a good polar alignment.  But first, a quick reminder about the upcoming star festival in Julian this next weekend, August 13-15.  This is a great opportunity to see some stars, check out all the vendors, have some apple pie and wake up in a bed and breakfast.  Check out http://julianstarfest.com

Well, as I mentioned last time I was having a hard time getting a good alignment and finally had a breakthrough at the Black Star canyon star party.  Amateur astronomer David had put me on to some YouTube videos going over alignment and I found