Telescope Reviews: Texas Rocks

Greetings all!

Seems like much of the country, especially the east coast, has been rain soaked as of late. Fortunately for us here in South Texas the skies have been relatively clear for a couple of weeks and the observing has been great. OK, so we've had 100 degree heat every day for what seems to be an eternity, but it's kept the clouds away. On the unfortunate side, we're experiencing terrible drought conditions and desperately need some torrential rains to get to aquifer levels back up. If anyone wants to trade a couple of rainy days for a couple of cloudless nights let me know!

Last night's observing was pretty good despite a spectacularly bright moon. Eastern and southeastern skies provided fairly good viewing opportunities...Dumbbell, Ring and Swan? nebula were very nice even without a filter. M13, Butterfly and Wild Duck shown brightly. However, the best event of the night had to have been Jupiter. My boys, 12 and 9, have been waiting to see Jupiter since we received our scope a couple of months ago, but we weren't able to stay up too late and wait for its rising...until last night that is. We patiently waited and spent time observing some of the other sights mentioned above. After a while we looked back, relatively low on the eastern horizon and saw a bright object. The older boy and I thought it might be an airplane heading straight towards us since there are several flight paths near us that head into the San Antonio airport (we were actually viewing on Randolph AFB about 20 miles east of SAT). I took a look through the binos and told him it wasn't an airplane so we swung the scope over to check it out. Sure enough it was what we had been waiting for, Jupiter in all its splendour at 11:40.

By this time the younger boy had fallen asleep so he missed out, but my older son and I observed it for the next 45 minutes or so as it rose into the sky. We slipped the 10mm in the focuser and wow, beautifully clear banding and five bright moons as a bonus. As it rose higher we put the 5mm in to take a look. Again, just about as clear as with the 10mm. By this time the planet had turned from a brilliant yellow/orange to whiter in color. After a few more minutes I decided to put the barlow and 5mmm togther. OK, I know I was pushing the scope to its limits, but it still provided a pretty incredible view in that nothing else we've looked at in the past could even compare with this combination. Truly an awesome sight. We stayed out hoping to see one of Jupiter's moon traverse its face, but wasn't going to happen for us. Still, we were thrilled to observe such a wonderful sight. We plan on checking it out again tonight so my older daughters can enjoy the view as well.

Anyway, my offer still stands, I'll trade some clear nights for some rainy days, but you gotta act fast because the views down here in South Texas are almost too good to pass up.

Cheers...Eric

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Orion XT8i
5mm Orion Stratus
10mm Orion Sirius Plossl
25mm Orion Sirius Plossl
32mm Orion Q70
Orion Shorty-Plus 2x Barlow