Stars in the park

Tonight was one of those exceptionally clear nights in south Texas with no moon, and it was Thursday on top of it. The night hike started an hour later due to DST so I met Javier at 7:00. There was a Master Naturalist class in session so we waited until 7:30 to set up. I showed Javier a little about the Celestron hand controller and we aligned on Jupiter, Venus, and Mars. It's disturbing how much I had forgotten about the scope since I last used it! It wasn't really dark by the time the first group showed up at 8:15 but dark enough to make out Jupiter's moons and M42. Later we switched to M45 and even glanced at Mars for a bit. A few from the class dropped by about 9:00 and we shut down at 9:30 after a good evening of viewing. The mosquitoes were thick but our Off managed to hold them at bay. Javier and I saw the HST about 8:15 and several saw meteors throughout the evening but I managed to be looking the other way every time. 'Jesse' and I had a long conversation about telescopes in general and he expressed an interest in getting something for home.
I tried to spot Garrad in the little 3" without luck. Later I tried with my 7x50's from my backyard observatory but still no luck. I could make out 38 UMa easy enough but no comet. The Celestron behaved pretty well though, even though we managed to kick and move it around quite a bit. The legs extended about 1/3 seemed to work out best. Javier was impressed with its 'tour' feature.
In the heat of quickly changing eye pieces and keeping things moving I managed to 'lose' one of the 25mm ep's. I found it in the bottom of my bag after returning home and gave it a good scolding for hiding from me.

No Garradd tonight

The last couple of nights have been pretty good seeing. Last night at our fish fry I was able to treat our friends to the pretty sight of Venus and Jupiter low in the west accompanied by Mercury even lower but shining brightly in the palm trees and Mars rising above the house in the east. It was clear enough that I decided to try for comet Garradd. No such luck last night. Tonight I came better prepared with my chart. I was able to make out the big dipper high in the north and Polaris above my neighbor's house but the neighborhood lights and a half moon made it difficult to see much else. In binoculars I was able to find Kocab (BetUMi) and Gamma UMi with it's dim companion. From there I slid just a bit east to find HR5589 and HR5691 and their dimmer companions which make a distinct trapezoid and point at the position of Garradd but no comet. It's just too bright for my 7x50's to pick out. I thought I was able to occasionally make out a pin point of light where the comet should have been but it was more stellar than a comet should have been. I'll have to try later when the moon is gone and Garradd rises higher toward UMa. I'll also have to try setting my scope up and using that or one at the park.