Stoneman Lake, Arizona (Dark Sky Site)
2003/09/26-27
Sirius Lookers of Sedona

I knew it was going to happen and at 9:30am, I woke up feeling like I was in a blazing inferno. I threw my covers off and tried to go back to sleep to no avail: it was too hot inside the tent with the sun shining on it. I got up and dragged my sleeping bag and laid it down on the ground in the cool shade next to my truck. John had risen long ago and I noticed him walking around inspecting our meadow. Sometime around 1pm, my shade ran out forcing me to wake. The day was spent lazing around the camp. Thom & Ron decided to take a drive over to another site that was being occupied by some of the other area astronomy clubs who were also enjoying the dark skies on a moonless night. Ellen, John and I sat in the shade of the awning talking and comparing notes we had taken from previous observing sessions.

John and I decided to inspect a chimney he had seen in the woods. We walked to the northeastern side of the meadow where John had noticed that somebody had built a dam long ago. The dam was about 4’ wide and 50’ long. The “lake” side the dam was built of dirt and stacked up, flat rocks but on the “dry” side, concrete had been used for the barrier. Having seen this confirmed my belief that at sometime in the not so distant past, our “meadow” must have contained water. Why would somebody have gone through the trouble of erecting this “dam” if there were not water to hold back? The dry side did not look like a river had run through it though. Surely it must have been a low point on the “lake” and only seeped water into the surrounding woods? I wondered if more of these structures were located anywhere else around the meadow. Having spent enough time looking and wondering about the dam, we walked over to the chimney that had been built.

The chimney was standing all alone and we could only find one corner of the house that had been built around the chimney. The chimney must have been at least 12’ tall and made out of native red rock. Some of the rock had fallen off and were lying on the ground. Brick had been used as inside of the fireplace and you could still see the old rusted metal piece that was the flume.

I could only imagine how hard it must have been to settle this land but how awesome it must have been to live in it. John and I spent about an hour wandering around the woods.

It was a beautiful day in a beautiful place. Not a cloud in the sky with temperatures in the high 70’s.
When we returned to the meadow, we found Dennis had returned as well as Thom and Ron from their outing in to the "Big City".

Shortly thereafter a new car approached the meadow and started driving towards us. It was a man named George whom I believe had recently moved to the Flagstaff area and discovered the Sirius Lookers or visa versa. He had two ‘scopes, one being an earlier version of a Tel-Vue wide-field refractor and the other an 18” Starmaster Truss Dobsonian! While I waited for darkness, Dennis helped me make some modifications to my 16” Starfinder.

He tightened the spider-vanes and the secondary mirror which made the assembly be more stable and not shake with vibrations. Then we took the rocker base off and moved the Teflon pads in towards the center as well as shaved the edges down which will cause less friction. We also removed half of the original pads and he lubed the center washers. Once reassembled, the ‘scope moved with much better ease even in the “dobby” hole.

Thom had his Meade 8” LX90 SCT zeroed in on Mars and I found the view to be better looking in the broad daylight then most of the times I had seen it at night. Earlier in the day he had the solar filter on and was looking at the sun which to me is a very curious sight.

Evening was upon us and I snapped a shot of the one day moon hanging just above the tree-line.

 

I also snapped one of Mars.

Soon after that we were called to diner. Thom had made his Sirius Looker famous fajitas. There were no leftovers and the coyotes voiced their anger! Thom quieted them with the soothing music of Bach and his “Planets” CD. Let the observing begin!

Starting where I left off last night, I began by finding another planetary. (I am only going to mention new objects that I saw) Located much higher above the Box Nebula in Ophiuchus, which is a fun name to compare pronunciations with other people, I found NGC 6572. It is visible in the finderscope and at 91x is very bright and very green in color. The size is round and uniform in shape. At 182x I could see the central star.

I had heard before that the North America Nebula is only visible photographically. Well, that may be true unless you’re in Stoneman! The West Coast, Texas, and the Gulf are clearly visible naked eye.

Next I viewed something I have seen from Lovell Canyon outside Las Vegas. I only mention is because I got a different view then I did from there. The object or should I say “objects” are close enough together to get a two-in-one view with the right eyepiece which George supplied me with. The objects are NGC 6946 & NGC 6939 and are located in Cepheus. These objects are featured in the November issue of Sky & Telescope.

While I was in Cepheus, the King of Ethiopia, I found a very small, but marvelous open-cluster with nebulosity. The object is NGC 7129 or Cr441. This object does not have a nick-name and I now pose one for it: The Smoking Gun Cluster. If you care to find it, you will see why.

For the next ½ hour or so I spent some time looking through Georges ‘scopes at the Veil. John was poking around the Capricornus/Aquarius region and I helped him find the Saturn Nebula, M72 & M73.

Returning to my ‘scope I chose to scout around a region I had not done so in the past. The constellation was Cetus the Whale. The first thing I found was a galaxy named NGC 247. It was very large but faint. Mind you, at the time I was doing this, Cetus and Sculptor which I looked at later were both in the murk of the horizon.

Also in Cetus I found a planetary named NGC 246. It too was large and very faint. The shape was round with no color and fairly uniformed in both. It reminded me of a dimmer M97; the Owl Nebula. I could see four stars within the nebulosity. SNP shows the faintest one to be called USNO J0046568-115155 and shines at a magnitude of 12.80.

When I was searching for the planetary I stumbled on another object that was not on my star-chart. It is a galaxy of a measly magnitude of 12.8. Of course it was nothing more then a blur and is called NGC 255. A picture I found of it on the internet shows it to be quite a nice little spiral galaxy.

The last object I found in Cetus was NGC 584. It is classified as a galaxy but I only found that out after returning home and checking with the “officials”. At the time I was not sure if it wasn’t a planetary. Its shape was that of a galaxy but the core looked blue to me. Further investigation will be in order once the object reaches a higher altitude.

Having done my damage in Cetus I moved down even lower in the murk to Sculptor. George had told me it contained a very nice galaxy called NGC 253. I had expected something like the other galaxies I had viewed tonight, maybe just a little brighter. I haven’t shouted out-loud lately when I’ve found something new but this object caused just that: I shouted very loudly. Loudly enough to make John think something had gone wrong with me. From the darkness I heard George’s voice say: “He must have found 253”. My description of it would probably be called blasphemy but I would compare it to Andromeda especially if viewed from more of southerly latitude. It was just incredible and stretched well beyond the 66 degree FOV of my Orion 20mm Expanse eyepiece. I took a break from my viewing to allow the others who wanted a look at this wonderful galaxy which Thom told me was called the Sculptor Galaxy.

Really, the Sculptor Galaxy should have been the final object I looked at being that it was more like a finale of a firework show. I knew our night was drawing to a close and dark skies like this would be few and far between. So, I kept on searching. Dew had started to set upon us slowing us down ever so slightly.

Keeping to Sculptor, I found a globular cluster called NGC 288. Many of the stars were resolved the brightest having the shape of a backwards lower-case “h”.

NGC 300 is a galaxy and is very, very large but very dim in the murk. It seems uniform in brightness.

NGC 55 is not as large as 300 in its width but is much longer. It was very slender and one is certainly much brighter then the other. The time was almost midnight and it was time to start packing for the journey home. I took my gaze from the ‘scope and stretched my arms above my head and looked skyward and got my last object of the night: a huge earth-grazer that shot nearly the breadth of the sky from north to south. I’ll take that one home too!

So, now it’s time to go. Packing in the dark is not fun and the others knew it. They didn’t yell or shout at me when us when the truck lights came on. In fact, they even suggested it so I wouldn’t hit one of the stray boulders that were in the meadow. John and I packed in about 45 minutes, said our goodbyes and were on our way. I had to leave early so I could get home with enough time to sleep before work on Sunday night. It had been a too short visit with my friends. Hey, Ara never came back…bummer.

The drive home was very pleasant. We drove super slowly on Lake Mary Road fearing Elk: we didn’t see any thank goodness. Once we got to Flagstaff I promptly found me an Elk-Plow, better know as an 18-Wheeler or Semi, and kept right behind it for ~145 miles! At Kingman, John took over the driving duties. This time, at the Hover Dam Security Check-point, not only did they ask “what’s in the big cardboard boxes”, they made us pull over, step out of the vehicle and open them up. Good thing we did our own packing and didn’t leave them unattended along the way! We spent the rest of the way home making up funny things to tell them next time. Unfortunately, some of the answers would probably land us in jail if not worse! Too funny…I wonder if I wrote “Telescope” on the box, would they still ask?

- New Objects Seen (Meade 16” Starfinder & Orion Expanse Eyepieces)

- NGC 6309 / PK9+14.1 (PN) / Mag: 10.80, Size: 52” x 52” / Ophiuchus [Box]
- NGC 6781 / PK41-2.1 (PN) / Mag: 11.4, Size: 1.9’ x 1.8’ / Aquila
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- NGC 6572 / PK34+11.1 (PN) / Mag: 8.1, Size: 16” x 13” / Ophiuchus
- NGC 7129 / Cr441 (OC with Nebulosity) / Mag: 11.50, Size: 2.7’ / Cepheus
- NGC 247 (Gx) / Mag: 9.1, Size: 20’ x 7.4’ / Cetus
- NGC 246 / PK118-74.1 (PN) / Mag: 10.9, Size: 4.6’ x 4.1’ / Cetus
- NGC 255 (Gx) / Mag: 12.40, Size: 3.1’ x 2.8’ / Cetus
- NGC 584 / IC 1712 (Gx) / Mag: 10.5, Size: 4.2’ x 2.3’ / Cetus
- NGC 253 (Gx) / Mag: 7.1, Size: 25’ x 7.4’ / Sculptor [Sculptor Galaxy]
- NGC 288 (GC) / Mag: 8.1, Size: 14’ / Sculptor
- NGC 300 (Gx) / Mag: 8.1, Size: 20’ x 15’ / Sculptor
- NGC 55 (Gx) / Mag: 7.9, Size: 32.4’ x 5.6’ / Sculptor

- NGC 7000 (BN) / Mag: 4.5, Size: 100’ x 60’ / 1600ly / Cygnus [North America Nebula]

- Other Objects Viewed:

M57 (Ring), NGC 6723, IC 4665, M17 (Swan), NGC 6946/6939, NGC 6992/6960 (Veil), NGC 7009 (Saturn Nebula), M72, M73, M31 (Andromeda), M32, M33 (Pinwheel), M13 (Hercules), M22, M92, NGC 7331, NGC 7320 (Stephen’s Quintet [2 of 5]), NGC 6543 (Cat’s Eye Nebula), M42 (Great Orion Nebula), M43, Running Man, Flame, (Horsehead)