Tonight I attended a star party at Steve's Vail View Observatory. The TAAA Astroimaging Special Interest Group meets there occasionally for a star party, and this weekend Steve invited us to spend both Friday and Saturday nights there.
I was not able to go last night, and today was an incredibly busy day with an early start for me, so I just didn't have energy to pack up my gear for an offsite session tonight. Instead, I set up a session in CCDAutopilot to run my scope all night, right here at Xanadu Observatory. But I did go out to Steve's, and logged in remotely from there to control my scope here. Things were running smoothly so it wasn't really necessary to log in, but it was kind of fun to play with it. Technology has become so advanced in amateur astronomy, and this was a good example - it's kind of strange to think about going to a star party and logging into the home observatory! Steve, Michael & Mary, and Dean were all there running their telescopes with CCD cameras, and Victor also was there.
I've been imaging every night for the past six nights, but have managed to get some sleep thanks to CCDAutopilot. I love astronomy, but I also really have fun making all the technology work properly.
Tonight was supposed to be the peak of the Orionid meteor shower, I saw a few but not too many. The skies at Steve's are certainly darker than mine so it was nice to get out in the warm night air and do some visual stargazing as well, although the moon was rather bright. It was dark enough to easily see M31, the Andromeda Galaxy, naked eye, even before the moon set.
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