Two Galactic Nights at Hope Slide
After an excessive amount of lunar observing in March and April, I was feeling ready for some more deep sky observing, specifically eager to hunt down the spring galaxies with my new-to-me 15” Obsession. Having seen what views it could provide under dark-ish conditions, I wanted to see how much better it would perform under the often transparent skies of Hope Slide.
Although Hope Slide’s skies are not ultra-dark, being borderline Bortle 3/4 according to https://www.lightpollutionmap.info/, at 900m of elevation, with mountains blocking the worse of the lights from the city of Hope, the conditions can get good. Last November, for example, Felix, Sean, and I (easily) observed the Horsehead Nebula with a 14” scope.
I packed my car with eyepieces and accessories and drove over to Jeff’s house, and we loaded up the 15” Obsession and his Tele Vue NP127 refractor, as well as his collection of eyepieces. My Subaru Outback was starting to feel rather full, and some rough mental math confirmed that the contents of the car were significantly more valuable than the car itself (us human beings not included of course as I’m not a cold-blooded utilitarian). The traffic wasn’t too bad thankfully on a beautiful sunny Friday evening and we made good time to Hope, stopping at a gas station to fill up. We each got a coffee and finished the 10-minute drive to Hope Slide Lookout, where we met with Felix, who was getting his 18” Dobsonian set up.
Jeff and I got the 15” set up and collimated in about 10 minutes, and Jeff also set up his 5” refractor alongside (as the “finderscope”). Dusk started turning to night, which is when we realized that the astoundingly bright white lights from the bathrooms off in the distance were right in our faces. We shuffled the 15” over so that some shrubs blocked the worst of the light pollution.
It was also quite windy, despite the forecast assuring us of the opposite. This would prove to impede much of our night, making high-power observing difficult and bringing back memories of the time at Porteau Cove when the (much stronger) winds blew over a 16” Dob.
We started our night observing some of the brighter Messier objects like M51, M81/M82, and M13. As the skies darkened, I swept the 15” through the dense region of galaxies in and around the Markarian’s chain, seeing galaxy after faint galaxy pop into the 31mm Nagler. Felix showed us M64, the Black Eye Galaxy, through his 18”, and it was aptly named, as the dark band of dust obscuring the bright nucleus was easily discerned.
Some other memorable views include the Whale Galaxy, NGC 4631, which in my 15” I could make out the distinct shape with some texturing in the starburst region, as well as its companion galaxy NGC 4627 revealed as a hazy patch. Nearby was the strange-looking NGC 4656/4657, known as the Hockey Stick Galaxy, again an apt name.
NGC 4565, the Needle Galaxy, showed as a thin edge-on galaxy with a distinctly bright and round core and a razor-thin dust lane that was easy to see in the 18”. Turning to some of the classics, the Pinwheel Galaxy, M101, showed three spiral arms and clusters of bright lights that I think are dense star-forming regions.
The Whirlpool Galaxy, M51, is one of my personal favourites, and it didn’t disappoint, showing off the two spiral arms with the bridge to its companion, NGC 5195. I also revisited the great globular cluster M13 multiple times with the 15”; paired with my new Nikon 17mm NAV HW eyepiece and the matched EiC-14 tele-extender, resulting in 14mm, the view was as good as I’d hoped - pinpoint stars resolved to the impossibly dense core, M13 was more immersive and 3-dimensional than in any other eyepiece I’ve used. I’ve put my 13mm XWA 100-degree eyepiece for sale. To my eye, the Nikon is substantially better. The rest of the night, my Nikon 17mm remained glued to the 15” in either 17mm or 14mm mode. It’s an expensive eyepiece, but like the 31mm Nagler, it’s turning out to be a workhorse.
After the Milky Way cleared the mountains to the northeast around 1 am, we observed both halves of the Veil Nebula, NGC 6992 and NGC 6995. Although our dobs can’t capture the entirety of the Veil at once, unlike a widefield refractor, I prefer viewing at higher powers with the OIII filter to pick out the masses of fine texture visible through a large scope.
Despite the wind, we managed to observe well over 100 galaxies that night. We all packed up our scopes a little past 3 am and drove back to Vancouver. By the time I was home, I could see the crescent moon rising and the night turns to early dawn.
After sleeping in for as long as I could manage, I picked up Martin from the SFU Astronomy Club, and his partner Linh, and we drove back to Hope Slide. It was the first time for both of them to observe from a dark site. Felix was also there again getting his 18” scope ready for another night of observing. Steve joined us a few minutes after we arrived and started setting up his 8” SCT and 4” refractor, a great combo. This time, having learned from our mistake from the night prior, we all set up behind a big pile of rocks and dirt to shield ourselves as best as we could from the bathroom lights and wind.
While Martin and Linh set up a tent, I set up the 15”, collimated it (Howie Glatter laser and TuBlug make this a breeze!), and turned the rear fan on to cool the primary, then tried to take a short nap in my car until it got dark. Unfortunately, some mosquitos managed to sneak inside my car and buzz around, thwarting my attempt to nap. I gave up and decided it was time to start observing.
One of the first things we looked at was M104, the Sombrero Galaxy, as it started to set behind some trees. I saw the big bright core and the distinct dust lane slowly hide behind some branches through Felix’s 18”. Then we revisited most of the galaxies we observed the night prior, noticing that the transparency was better with much less wind, aiding us in teasing out more detail in the faint spiral arms of galaxies. One of the highlights for me was M101 - the spirals were more detailed than I’d ever seen previously, with distinct regions of bright star-forming regions. Little did I know that a few days later, a massive star would explode in a supernova that would become easily visible in an amateur telescope.
I made sure to find Martin and Linh some of the showpiece objects in the spring night sky, like M13, M51, M81/M82, Veil and Dumbbell Nebula, among others. Martin in particular was ecstatic to see these deep sky objects in their true glory, away from light pollution and with significant aperture.
Felix, Steve, Linh and I called it a night around 1 am, as we were all getting tired, but Martin kept going - he happily observed with the Obsession right till the first hints of dawn around 4 am and told me that he managed to star-hop and locate many of the Messier objects I had found for him a couple of hours prior. Not a bad first night under dark skies for him!
We packed up the scope and napped till the sun cleared the mountains, packed up the tent, and drove back home, fueled by the ancient light of distant galaxies.
