Open night at the shop, 2019

Well, at least it didn’t actually rain! We could have thought of better weather for the open night. The clouds had been with us all day, apart from a brief bit of blue late in the afternoon. By the time people began to arrive, the cloud layer had grown to the point where the Moon peeked through gaps every few minutes, but then disappeared again.

However, the night was absolutely made by the fantastic people who showed up. Everyone was enthusiastic and engaged by the telescopes. It was really rewarding to hear so many questions coming from people who were so obviously interested in the hardware.

We had a range of scopes, a couple of Dobsonians (an 8” and a 10”), a 127mm Maksutov, a Celestron CGX800 and a saxon 127mm triplet refractor. We also had a Celestron CPC925 available but sadly it didn’t get brought out before it clouded over.

People also had fun with their own phones and a saxon ScopePix, taking photos through the scopes. Most people took photos of the Moon, but a few were able to get shots of Jupiter, which put in the very occasional appearance between the clouds.

Amanda Kung won the astrophotography contest for photos taken on the night. Check out her photo below. Runner-up was David Yeowart and third place went to Martin Wojczus. Congratulations to all the winners.