Carnival in Hooge Mierde

Here the brassband is walking up front....








The Alpen-Express........











One of the bigger walking groups........








In my opinion the most beautiful car....











The prince-car

Hailywood pre-carnival concert

Last sunday our local brassband of Hooge Mierde, Sirena, performed many Hollywood-tinted tunes......They called it "Hailywood".






Everybody is dressed up with hats: Indiana Jones theme....







The audience with in the back the board of 11 and the prince-carnival.

Walk on "De Regte Heide" near Goirle

Here's a view on a very nice birdwatching hut. We stayed there for a while to observe the birds.











There were 2 wild horses grazing in the meadow...







This is a view on the field.....







Apart from a group of ducks and a swan there were some buzzards roaring in the sky. Here's one of them.

Bino observing

Now and then the clouds opened, but sometimes it was still raining now and then. I decided to observe with my 10x50 bino.....With that I can hop in and out of the house in a flash and still do some observing.
I started around 1930hrs, temperature 2.7C seeing: bad.
M42 Orion Nebula: nicely visible just between the 2 groups of stars (they form a straight line with M42). By looking periphery the nebula became slightly bigger.
M36 & M38 (Auriga): these star clusters were visible as weak nebulae.
M45 Pleiades: nice and beautiful open star cluster. Nebulae not visible. Fits the FOV (field of view) in my bino nicely.
After that some clouds came in and after a while the whole sky was covered in it: so I hopped quickly inside the house.
2215hrs, temperature 1.8C Seeing: average
M44: Praesepe beehive cluster. Nice open star cluster, comes out of the background. Stars of almost the same magnitude. Fits easily in the FOV of the bino.
Clouds again, so I hopped inside the house.
2236hrs, temperature 1.4C Seeing: good (despite the almost full moon that just rose above the horizon)
M37 (Auriga) & M35: visible as very faint nebulae. Directly visible.
Mel 25 Hyades in Taurus: very open star cluster. It consist of more sub-groups.
After that I observed Saturn (between Leo and the moon).
So: I could still do some (unexpected) observing......

Primary mirror cleaning

A few weeks ago I saw this very annoying smudge on my primary mirror. I think it was a droplet of water that fell of the secondary mirror after a observing session.....Since it was almost entirely behind the secondary mirror it did not really influende telescope performane....but every time I collimated my telescope I saw this very irritating smudge.....



With the help of clean water with only 1 small droplet of dishwashing soap and some cotton pads I was able to remove it very slowly. Every time taking a new pad, dripping it in water, and slowly move it to the middle of the mirror, without pushing (only letting the pad clean by its own weight). After that I picked up the water with every time a clean pad....The smudge stain is almost 100%, only a very small one remains, but I consider that acceptable.

The One recording "Heel veel Hebben"

Here we are recording the guitar part in the Flash studio in Biest-Houtakker

Live podcast of our astronomy night of last saturday.

The One recording their new album

Here we are recording the drums for our new album in the Flash studio in Biest-Houtakker...

Messier night in Netersel

Last night was very cold, because of the wind. But because of that the sky was very clear. So we decided to go to the small airfield in Netersel with my 200mm newton telescope. I was the first there and after some time 2 fellow astronomers (morelinux with his 200mm LX90 SCT and g0t0 with his 250mm LX-200 beast). Here's a list of my observations:
M3, beautiful globular cluster. With perifhery looking more and more stars become visible. No arms visible. I got the best view in my 8mm Hyperion on 125x.
M44, Praesepe open star cluster in Cancer. It is a real joy to look at this object. It just fits the FOV (field of vision) in my 200mm newton with 32mm Astro-tech titan eyepiece on 31x.
M51, bright spiral galaxy with companion galaxy NGC5195. They are visible as 2 small dots in the 21mm Hyperion at 47x.
M63, galaxy, just visible periphery as a weak dot in the 8mm Hyperion at 125x.
M67, compact and beautiful open cluster. Many stars visible of almost the same magnitude. Best at 47x.
M85, galaxy visible as a bright center with a weak nebula on 125x.
M87, galaxy visible as a bight dot at 125x. No further details visible.
M94, galaxy visible as a bright dot (no nebula visible) at 125x.
M99, galaxy just visible periphery at 125x.
M100, galaxy just visible by looking periphery at 125x.
M101, serious periphery looking necessary to view this galaxy. There is a glimpse of a faint nebula visible at 47x.
M106 bright galaxy, visible like a cigar. Best visible at 125x.
At the end of the session (around 0130hrs) some clouds came from the east. After 30min the whole sky was covered with clouds. It was a clear and especially dry night. My telescope and eyepieces were not covered with condense. That is very unique for Dutch atmospheric conditions.

Walk in Oisterwijk

Here's one of the lakes in Oisterwijk. It is -almost- frozen.....we saw some daredevils skating on some other lakes.