What a night!

[stewe]

Two days ago I had a most memorable night, one of those that come about very scarcely at my location.

I was observing from a not-so-dark site (Bortle 5) in the premises of an old observatory in Germany. But the seeing.. The seeing was so excellent that I have rarely seen in my life and mostly from the Atacama desert, and certainly not experienced since I acquired my C9.25. Too bad that no planet was visible on that night.

I spent a lot of time on M42, enjoying the view and trying to take in all the unbelievable amount of intricate detail and colors. The Sinus Magnus looked completely three dimensional, and even M43 had a good level of detail. By looking at the Orion nebula in its full, unprecedented (for me) glory, I reached a very relaxed, mindful state. During that night I realized that probably one of the main reasons I love visual work so much is the highly meditative state of the mind it leads to, and the stress relief it consequently causes.
To illustrate the quality of the view, the E and F stars were not just discernible already at a magnification of ~62x (!), but they literally jumped at me from the ES68 40mm eyepiece. I have not seen such a view of the Trapezium cluster before.

Another stunner was the Eskimo Nebula (NGC 2392). I went through magnifications of ~62x, ~140x, and ~210x. At 210x, the contrast was awesome, the nebula had a faint but distinctive greenish-blueish color, and it showed a lot of detail in its outer shell. Then I took the 7mm Vixen ortho out from my eyepiece case... I do not even remember when I made use of it the last time, but it was certainly not with this telescope. Nevertheless, I always keep it in the case, since it is so tiny, and who knows when I will need it... Well, this time I needed it: at 360x magnification, and after a minute or so of viewing, the nebula showed complex details of its inner shell. I did not know that it was even possible with my scope, especially not without a filter.

This time my C9.25 demonstrated some of its true capabilities to me, and I could not be more delighted!

[John Baars]

Well done!
Good observations and a very pleasant story.
Thanks for your report!

[Voyageur]

Congratulations on such an exceptional night of viewing, Steve. Well-written report; I enjoyed reading it.

[bladekeeper]

Congratulations on an excellent night, Steve! Those are rare indeed when both seeing and transparency cooperate.

[Juno16]

Great night Steve!

Except from not seeing the views, I felt like I was right there with you!

Thanks for the nice read.

Jim

[terrynak]

Beautiful report Stewe! I myself have never seen stars E & F in the Trapezium.

Been a while since I've seen the Eskimo Nebula (8 yrs!). With slightly better equipment now at my disposal, I should revisit this object.

Interesting that you've observed from the Atacama Desert. This is on my to-do list - to go to Chile and observe from there.

[10538]

Congratulations on a great night out Steve! Thanks for sharing your well written report! I really enjoyed reading it!

[Don Quixote]

A wonderful night indeed!
Congratulations in this very fine outing and outstanding views. It has been a pleasure to read your inspiring report.
Bravo, Steve !

[Bigzmey]

What a wonderful evening Steve! I can relate to your feeling of tranquility. Glad to hear about the great performance of C9.25" Can't wait to put mine to the good use.