Post by sergflo41 on Jan 11, 2013 16:32:03 GMT -6
Hi All,
I'm new to this site and new to astronomy. When I say new I mean I never, until recently, really cared or even thought about the cosmos. Living in the city all you really see are the moon and maybe some really bright stars or maybe those are planets. Anyway, this past summer we had Venus crossing the Sun and after viewing it through one of the telescopes setup by the Adler it struck me....the big picture. We(Earth), like Venus, are an object floating around in space along with other objects, some smaller and some immensely bigger. It was almost impossible to comprehend the gravity (no pun intended) of what is going on out there. So, that's all the touchy feely reasons why I've become interested in astronomy. Then, this past October I went camping out by Starved Rock and one night, while walking through a corn field, I witnessed something so awesome! It was a shooting star but not one of those wisps of light type of deals. It was this thing, and I hope it wasn't just some space junk, that burned for like 1-2 seconds. I mean you could see the fire coming off of this thing and the length of it's tail was probably a quarter of the sky....really cool! That was it. I decided I would pick up a telescope. Fast forward to yesterday, 01/10/13, I learned that Helix was going out of business and had a bunch of stuff on clearance, still do as a matter of fact, including telescopes. I picked up a Meade ETX-80AT. I'm not sure of what specs are the ones that matter but I've listed a few of them below. What I'd really like to know is where are some of the best spots in the city to observe the night sky. Or, maybe there's a thread already out there where peeps have some good recommendations??? I live by Goose Island and there is a ton of light around here so viewing the night sky isn't really the greatest. I do have a great view of the skyline though. Thanks, any advice or recommendations are much, much appreciated. Thanks Joe for this site.
Meade ETX-80AT-BB Backpack Observatory
Optical design - Achromatic Refactor
Clear aperture - 80mm (2.76")
Focal length - 400mm
Focal rati (photographic speed) - f/4.4
I'm new to this site and new to astronomy. When I say new I mean I never, until recently, really cared or even thought about the cosmos. Living in the city all you really see are the moon and maybe some really bright stars or maybe those are planets. Anyway, this past summer we had Venus crossing the Sun and after viewing it through one of the telescopes setup by the Adler it struck me....the big picture. We(Earth), like Venus, are an object floating around in space along with other objects, some smaller and some immensely bigger. It was almost impossible to comprehend the gravity (no pun intended) of what is going on out there. So, that's all the touchy feely reasons why I've become interested in astronomy. Then, this past October I went camping out by Starved Rock and one night, while walking through a corn field, I witnessed something so awesome! It was a shooting star but not one of those wisps of light type of deals. It was this thing, and I hope it wasn't just some space junk, that burned for like 1-2 seconds. I mean you could see the fire coming off of this thing and the length of it's tail was probably a quarter of the sky....really cool! That was it. I decided I would pick up a telescope. Fast forward to yesterday, 01/10/13, I learned that Helix was going out of business and had a bunch of stuff on clearance, still do as a matter of fact, including telescopes. I picked up a Meade ETX-80AT. I'm not sure of what specs are the ones that matter but I've listed a few of them below. What I'd really like to know is where are some of the best spots in the city to observe the night sky. Or, maybe there's a thread already out there where peeps have some good recommendations??? I live by Goose Island and there is a ton of light around here so viewing the night sky isn't really the greatest. I do have a great view of the skyline though. Thanks, any advice or recommendations are much, much appreciated. Thanks Joe for this site.
Meade ETX-80AT-BB Backpack Observatory
Optical design - Achromatic Refactor
Clear aperture - 80mm (2.76")
Focal length - 400mm
Focal rati (photographic speed) - f/4.4
