ALP November 02, 2008 Stargazing Session
by James Kevin Ty
Images by James Kevin Ty and Vincent Lao

Amid a bad weather outlook in the morning of November 1, ALP president James Kevin with consultation with ALPers joining the stargazing session at Caliraya decided to cancel the session.  But in the afternoon, the weather suddenly turn good and James texted them to inform them that the stargazing trip will proceed.  But unfortunately, members who were supposed to join had already decided to do other chores that afternoon :(  Only James and Vincent Lao decided to make the long trip to try their luck at Caliraya.  James pick up Vincent at his home at around 5:30pm and proceeded to the observing site.  As they were in the SLEX, bright planet Venus  is 3 degrees North of the thin crescent Moon to form a beautiful conjunction and Vincent took a handheld snap shot of the pair while they were cruising .

When they reach Caliraya at around 9:00pm, lady luck seems to run out for both of them as they were greeted with hard  rain !   Since they were already there, they both decided to wait for a while and hope the rain will stop.  At around 10:30pm, the eastern sky started to break up and they were able to see Orion rising majestically.  Unfortunately, mild shower was still present that time and was still trying to ruin their session :(   With the hard rain comes a very muddy observing site  (click image on the right and see how muddy their setup area was.) James initially plan to quit the session because the telescope tripod will surely sink into the mud but seeing Vincent still enjoying binocular viewing of the beautiful sky, they decided to stick around more and after searching for a lesser muddy area , they setup their scopes at around 11:30 pm after the rain finally comes to a stop. 

James brought along a TV-101 refractor on Vixen GP-DX mount while Vincent  brought his new Orion Starblast 4.5" reflector on EQ-1 mount.  With a compromise area, the view of the sky was not perfect as some parts of the sky from South to Southwest were block by tall trees.  The original observing area that they regularly setup before were under the water.  For  James, he was a bit disappointed on the weather because the unexpected early heavy rain doused cold water on his original imaging plans for the night :(   So he opted instead to image old favorites such as Orion Nebula, Pleiades star cluster, and California Nebula.  Vincent , on the other hand, image M35, Double Cluster, constellation Orion, and Beehive star cluster.

They were also able to observe several Orionids meteor shower and lots of sporadics as well.  The night was not that perfect though as there were 2 mild rains that pour on them in the morning :( 

They were able to observe till around 4:30am before the sky started to get brighter already.  Before they started to  dismantle their scopes, they had a group picture taken before packing up their equipment.  As they dismantling their scopes, they were able to observe  beautiful crepuscular rays as the Sun was starting to rise .

Despite the disappointing sky and muddy conditions in the early evening, they  were happy and satisfied. It has really been a long time since ALP had a successful observing session and they were really grateful for taking their chances that evening session.

Below are images taken by James Kevin Ty & Vincent Lao at Caliraya:

M42 Great Orion Nebula in Orion Image taken by James Kevin Ty using TV-101 refractor at prime focus. 864mm f/5.4. Total 24 minutes exposure at ISO 1600.	M45 Pleiades Star Cluster in Taurus Image taken by James Kevin Ty using TV-101 refractor at prime focus. 864mm f/5.4. Total 20 minutes exposure at ISO 1600.
NGC 1499 California Nebula in Perseus Image taken by James Kevin Ty using TV-101 refractor at prime focus. 864mm f/5.4. Total 21 minutes exposure at ISO 1600.	Constellation Orion Image taken by Vincent Lao using Canon A540 digicam with 28mm f/2.6 at ISO 800. Total 128 sec exposure.
M35 Star Cluster in Gemini Image taken by Vincent Lao using Canon A540 digicam with 17mm eyepiece. Afocal. EFL= 1026mm f/ 9.  Total 30 sec exposure at ISO 800.	M44 Beehive Star Cluster in Cancer Image taken by Vincent Lao using Canon A540 digicam with 17mm eyepiece. Afocal. EFL= 1026mm f/ 9.  Total 30 sec exposure at ISO 800.

For Comments jkty@astroleaguephils.org