10th Annual NEBRASKA STAR PARTY summary (long)

My View of the 10th Annual
NEBRASKA STAR PARTY
July 27th - August 1st, 2003

Well, all in all, I had a pretty darn good experience at NSP-10,
although as with any star party, I never got all I wanted to do done. I
packed my 10 inch Newtonian and my 100mm f/6 refractor, and left the house at
6:25 a.m. on Saturday morning July 26th from my home in Beatrice under cool
variably cloudy skies. It was a pleasant six-hour drive into the high
Sandhill country of western Nebraska to reach Merritt Reservoir nestled in the
former upper reaches of the Snake River Canyon 28 miles southwest of
Valentine. I also tempted fate and tried the imfamous Brownlee Road short-cut
well southeast of the reservoir. This one-lane winding road is black-topped,
but its narrowness and its deep sandy shoulders made it a somewhat riskier
route for those who want to save time. Still, the road lead me into a sort of
Nebraskan "Shangri La"; a wonderful green flat-floored hidden valley of
ranches and farms, framed by 200 to 300 foot-high grassy but nearly treeless
dunes.
After getting settled into my 2-bed cabin at the little Merritt Resort
facility and sampling the evening buffet at Merritt's "The Water's Edge"
restaurant, I headed out to the Snake Campground next to where the observing
fields were. I helped fellow club member Brian Sivil get his big tent up, and
despite my "help", he still got it properly erected :-). I then ran into Bob
Cuberly from Illinois, who had his huge camping trailer parked in the shade of
some trees. We spent time talking and taking some refreshment in the cool
breeze blowing through the campground (it had been 111 degrees F. the previous
afternoon). Bob gave us a look at his monster Astrophysics mount which could
have held a 14 inch with ease, but he was only using a 6 inch planetary
Newtonian on it. He hadn't set up his 15 inch Obsession, but it would clearly
be only a matter of time until he did. Tom Miller of Lincoln, Nebr. showed up
a few minutes later to say that he had indeed brought the 30 inch Obsession to
NSP. The sky was mostly cloudy, so several of us congregated in the luxury of
Bob Cuberly's camper for a while. We got some nice holes in the cloud cover,
but it never cleared enough to justify getting the "big guns" out. I made the
rounds of the early birds and did a lot of renewing old friendships, but we
didn't observe other than with binoculars or the unaided eye.
Sunday was the first official day of the star party, marked chiefly by
the start of registration in "Dillon's Lounge" in the lower level of the
restaurant at Merritt Resort. The air was a bit warmer, which allowed many of
the arriving families to take advantage of the sandy beach and warm water of
Merritt reservoir for swimming and boating. I got over to the observing
fields and pulled out my 10 inch for a reporter at the Sioux Falls TV station
KELO so he could do an interview and get some footage of some of setups on the
dunes. The sky once again did not want to cooperate very well as the night
began, although it teased us with a spectacular sunset and some hazy openings
at times. At least the photographer from NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC (doing an
article on the Great Plains) probably got some decent pictures of the area and
the sunset before it got too dark to shoot. Some who did set up got fairly
decent views of Mars once it cleared the clouds near the horizon in the wee
hours of the morning, although the more "serious" observing would have to wait
another day. I got back to Merritt Resort to an area above the beach behind
our cabins where our NSP staff usually congregates for some refreshments and
late-night talk. My roommate John Lammers from Fairbury finally got in rather
late, but at least he managed to navigate the Brownlee Road without incident
(and in the dark no less).
Monday was partly cloudy, and I was quite busy. John Johnson of Omaha
and I were the instructors for the 3-day NSP "Beginner's Field School", so we
had to be up and running for the start of our first session at noon. After
lugging the box of 100 Field School Manuals from my cabin (as well as my big
"portable library"), I was startled to see the number of people filing into
the restaurant for our first session. For only the introductory session, it
looked like we had 43 people and of those, a majority indicated that it was
only their first of second star party. We covered things like star party
etiquette, planispheres, star atlases, guide books, constellations, and
finding techniques. After a nice meal at the Water's Edge, we went back over
to the observing field for the NSP Ice Cream social, a nice mixer for those
who had never been at the star party before. The skies showed a lot more blue
than the previous evening, so the guy from National Geographic was also busy
on the fields. After the first of the doorprizes were handed out, I hiked
back towards the southern observing fields to see what was going on.
I ended up doing more of a "walk-about", observing with others' scopes
rather than mine. Dob Row and the area around it was getting a little
crowded, as there were quite a number to choose from (anything from 5 inch
refractors to 8 and 10 inch SCT's to 10 and 13 inch Dobs to a 25 inch
Obsession). I wandered away and ended up spending some time helping club
member Liz Bergstrom with her new C8 that was proving difficult to manage. We
finally got it set up and did at least get the binoviewer to work with it,
although we were cursing the inadequate locking screws on the star diagonal.
Much later on, I linked up with a guy from California who had just come from
being "skunked" by forest fires and bad weather at the Wyoming Star Party.
Despite a little haze and a weak Aurora at times, we had a pretty good session
with his 22 inch truss-tube Dobsonian. We hit a lot of the "usual suspects"
(showpieces which almost everyone looks at initially) before going after more
difficult targets. The "Cat's Eye" nebula (NGC 6543) was sharp and detailed
as I had seen in years, with the arc-like inner detail and central star easily
seen. I mentioned a trio of galaxies in Draco (NGC's 5981, 5982, and 5985),
so we had a look at them. This trio consists of an edge-on spiral, a somewhat
smaller elliptical, and a tilted spiral, all in a short line which could be
fitted into a 20' arc field of view. The edge-on galaxy showed its slight
nuclear bulge, while the middle elliptical showed a small brighter core, and
the larger tilted spiral showed its nucleus with mottled spiral detail in the
outer haze. After going back to help Liz coax her 8 inch SCT back into its
cases, I called it a night around 3 a.m., as I had to get at least a little
sleep so I would be coherent enough to teach at the Beginner's Field School.
Tuesday was bright and sunny, and so was my disposition. The second day
of the field school (Telescopes and Equipment) went pretty well with over 50
in attendance, although I sometimes found it hard to get these new people to
ask the questions they really needed to ask. One of the NSP committee members
from the Platte Valley group in central Nebraska gave me a CD-ROM with some
shareware on it as a doorprize for the school. When one guy in the back row
of the restaurant finally asked a question, I answered it and then awarded him
the disk, letting everyone else in the room know that sometimes, asking a
question provides more of a reward than just the answer! Once I finished with
the Field School, I took a look at the two vendors set up on the north
entrance to the restaurant (Astrosystems and Camera Concepts). Liz Bergstrom,
our club's "binocular afficionado", was quickly consulted on one pair of
Celestron 10x60's I had my eye on. The recommendation "BUY THEM" came back,
and I became $99 poorer but at least now, I have a decent pair which are
tack-sharp and don't slide out of focus!
I noticed large cumulus clouds in the north, activating my storm-spotter
instincts. A quick look at the radar showed a line of intense thunderstorms
was bearing down on our area with a severe thunderstorm watch in effect. We
sent Liz to the observing fields to warn people. Still, even as the sky
darkened and the wind began to increase, the vendors kept right on selling
their stuff! Finally, as the gust front arrived, it forced them to quickly
pile their wares into boxes, vans, and the foyer of the restaurant until the
storm passed. The storm dumped a heavy burst of rain over the area, but the
skies cleared before sunset and we had a great night of viewing. John Lammers
and I set up his 8 inch f/5 Newtonian, my ten inch f/5.6 Newtonian, and my
100mm f/6 refractor next to where the road in the site splits to go to either
Dob Row or the lower campground. While my computer was doing a disk scan
initiated by Windows for a boot problem, I wandered around a bit. I did a
little trouble shooting on a new ETX finder one attendee was trying to get to
work, and when I finished there, another gentleman grabbed me to work on a
balky LX-90 which wouldn't do a proper 2-star alignment (minor finderscope
problem again). I wandered over to Dob Row for a look at M13 in Tom Miller's
30 inch, and I could see color in some of the stars.
Finally, my laptop computer I use for MEGASTAR finished its little
Win95-induced tirade and it was time to observe. The Milky Way put on its
usually stunning visual show, being easily seen even before twilight ended.
John put his 30mm WideScan III eyepiece in my 100mm f/6 refractor (a *FOUR*
degree field of view at 20x), and we were blown away by the views up and down
the Milky Way. Imagine viewing *both* M8 and M20 in all their glory the same
Field of view with the UHC filter and you get the idea. We cruised the dark
nebulae which flow around and past the large Sagittarius star cloud, and held
M24 in awe as a glistening cloud of stars framed nicely in the eyepiece. The
Scutum star cloud was particularly well shown in that little 100mm aperture,
bounded by patches of dark nebulosity and M11 shining brightly on its northern
edge. The entire Veil Nebula was beautifully displayed in the scope with the
UHC and OIII filters, including both arcs and the small triangular mass
between them. The North America and Pelican Nebulae were also easy targets in
that scope. In fact, other than a few brief looks at things (and some long
looks at Mars), I didn't use my ten inch nearly as much as the refractor.
After a look at M31 in the refractor (wonderful as usual), we were taking a
break when I glanced up at the head of Draco and decided to do a little star
counting. John and I found a dim triangle of three stars near the middle of
the head asterism, so I turned around to my computer to find out how faint
they were. The one near the center of the head was easiest at magnitude 5.75,
and the second one was 6.61, but to my surprise, the third and faintest star
in the triangle was 7.59! It was *definitely* a good night!
We went up to the 22 inch Dob on the ridge next to our observing spot and
did some more sight-seeing. We looked at the core of M31, and the whole area
seemed to be faintly yellowish-orange, somewhat like the color of Arcturus.
The owner was looking at planetaries, but did agree to try for the "Bubble"
nebula NGC 7635 in Cassiopeia. He thought he found it, but when I looked in,
it was clear that he had found something else. He was pointed at the nearby
nebula NGC 7538, which looks like an irregular puff ball around a pair of
stars. A few nudges later brought the Bubble Nebula into the field. For the
first time, I could just begin to see the arc-like cusps which give this
object its name. We even tried (and saw) the central star in M57 before going
back to planetary hunting. Mars was showing a fair amount of detail in my ten
inch with Syrtis Major sitting near the middle of the planet. The 22 inch
showed it as well, but seeing had started to decline a bit. Since we were in
the area, we hit the Helix Nebula, and it was quite nice with the OIII filter.
After a quick trip down Dob Row, we both decided to call it a night.
Wednesday was the last day of the Field School, and we covered a lot of
ground on eyepieces, observing techniques, and projects. I also spent more
money to buy a 30mm WideScan III eyepiece from Astrosystems. The NSP Beach
Party then got into full swing, with sand volleyball, a sand wedge pitching
contest, 2-legged races, and a lot of fun in the water. The kids had a lot of
fun with the water balloon toss, with NSP Clear Skies Coordinator Alan Scruggs
of Amarillo, Texas being the main target. Brewers Tubing brought out their
gigantic Indian-style canoe which holds between 10 and 20 people, and many
took advantage of it for a quick trip out onto the lake. At about the same
time, the swap meet was being held in Dillon's lounge and I noticed that John
Lammers had finally sold one of his eyepieces. Later, the free Bratts
Barbeque was held and more doorprizes were awarded, followed by a long night
of observing under a clear sky. At Merritt Resort, a public star party was
also held that evening put on by a small group of NSP staff and attendees.
Between 50 and 100 people from the area showed up, and were treated to a
constellation talk by NSP regular Lorri May of Wentworth, South Dakota, along
with viewing in 4 and 5 inch refractors, a couple of medium-sized Dobs, and an
18 inch Obsession.
Thursday was the day of the tubing/canoe trip down the Niobrara river,
where a lot of people took in the scenery of the canyon or got wet in the
water gun battles on the tubes or from standing under Nebraska's highest
waterfall, Smith Falls. A catered steak dinner was held that evening at the
Water's Edge restaurant, and after that, most went back to the observing
fields. I ran into the reporter from the NBC affiliate KNOP in North Platte
and we had a nice discussion about what he had filmed. The western sky was
starting to fill with high clouds from some thunderstorms in the area, so most
only got an hour or two of viewing before having to tear down for the night.
Friday was the last full day of the star party and was highlighted by
the formal presentations held in Valentine at the United Methodist Church.
This was a change in venue, as the High School was undergoing a replacement of
its air conditioning system, but the large church meeting room worked quite
well. Several vendors were present, including Pete Smitka of Mag-1
instruments, and the swap meet also continued in the hallway. In the main
meeting room, Bill O'Donnell gave a fascinating multi-media presentation of
"Astronomy in Art, Music and Poetry", although he may never live down his
reading of the Children's book "Goodnight Moon" to a bunch of adult
Astronomers! This was followed by lunch on-site provided by Pizza Hut and
served by local school students to make money for their activities. The next
speaker was Michael O'Connor's "Dakota Star Lore", followed by Richard
Nugent's presentations, "The Age of the Crab Nebula Supernova", and a short
one on the International Occultation Timing Association. The last talk was by
South Dakotan Ron Dyvig, entitled, "Badlands Observatory...From the Ashes". A
large number of door prizes were then given away, with the grand door prize
being a 6 inch Dob from Hardin Optical for the kids and a Meade ETX-125EC
Mak-Cassegrain for the adults.
Those not having to travel back home went back out to Merritt Reservoir
for a final night of observing under clear skies. Many of the NSP staff had a
full-blown cook-out behind the cabins with lots of food for everyone. The
crescent moon made its appearance, but it didn't stay up long and certainly
didn't hurt things all that much. Richard Nugent brought his I3 image
intensified eyepiece and put it on Don Chrysler's 14 inch Celestron SCT,
where it was directed at a large number of things. Although the number of
people present was down from earlier in the week, Dob Row remained the center
of all the action, with a large number of scopes set up, including Jim
Rippey's 25 inch Obsession. Most observed to at least 3 a.m., when many of us
decided to break down early due to having to travel long distances home after
dawn (I had to get going by 11:00 a.m.).

Final numbers we ATTENDEES: between 270 and 300.
NIGHTS CLEAR: 4 (including 3 in a row).
NIGHTS PARTLY CLOUDY: 2,
NIGHTS COMPLETELY OVERCAST: ZERO!

Hopefully, we will see you all at the next Nebraska Star Party. Clear skies
to you.

--
David W. Knisely
Prairie Astronomy Club: http://www.prairieastronomyclub.org
Hyde Memorial Observatory: http://www.hydeobservatory.info/

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* Attend the 10th Annual NEBRASKA STAR PARTY *
* July 27-Aug. 1st, 2003, Merritt Reservoir *
* http://www.NebraskaStarParty.org *
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