Mersing: A Second Chance/Look
Mersing: A Second Chance/Look
Recee report and pictures to come. Stay tuned!
-
timatworksg
- Posts: 767
- Joined: Mon Feb 01, 2010 9:42 pm
- Location: Pasir Ris
Ooi! No trailer? Preview? Teaser? Like Smurfs 3D?...haha!
- Cue in-music (Orchestra Grand intro)
- Cue in Narration with deep voice ("coming this week!....something that needed a second look!....Something we never thought would be.....)
- Insert 'Remus's pictures (zzzzzzzzzzzzz)
LOL....awaiting bro!
- Cue in-music (Orchestra Grand intro)
- Cue in Narration with deep voice ("coming this week!....something that needed a second look!....Something we never thought would be.....)
- Insert 'Remus's pictures (zzzzzzzzzzzzz)
LOL....awaiting bro!
My wife never complained about how much time, effort & money I spent on my Astronomy hobby!................suddenly I met her!!!
Peering through the rain-pelted windows and whizzing pass the greyish oil palm landscapes, it was hard to imagine that all of us were heading home with a sense of satisfaction and accomplishment.
What a big contrast it was compared to just a day before, with the sun-baked sands, lucious greens, and water-frolicking, all against a wide backdrop of blue hues and warmish breezes.
All of us came with a glimmer of hope, and a dash of positiveness, that perhaps this old site that we used to so very often extract its starry night splendour, could once again encourange us to explore it, use it, with open arms - and sure it did. Almost like sipping a glass of old fine wine...
It was almost dusk when we reached the Mersing site where the new chalets stood. We booked two sea-front units and they were facing east away from the other unit lights further inland. The thin cusp slither of light low in the west immediately caught our attention, and together with the Belt of Venus all encompassing, it looked like a promising start, or even a possible productive night for us imagers. Very quickly, we settled down at the chalets and gobbled down the chicken bits bought from the spanking new KFC in Mersing Town.
Since it was the first time we stayed at these chalets, and with the stars popping out one after another, we quickly decided to pick the spot of clearing beyond the eastern fenced compound, where it was furthest and also shielded from the chalets' light sources. Those other sea-front-facing chalets were pre-occupied but it was not difficult to negotiate with the occupants to have their spotlights turned off later in the night.
Our imaging site was further made more conducive for imaging with tables and chairs, not to mention an abundance of snacks and hot coffee to bring us through the night which was never expected to last in its entirety.
Altogether, there were four primary imaging platforms - Elton's GM8-FS60 inaugural entity, Kelvin's GM8-FSQ85 and GPD-FS60 (yes! operating both at the same time for him was a fun and marvel to watch), and my trusty G11-AP130. With Elton's Bose audio sound-system, it was very nice soothing feel to have clean background music against the Milky Way vistas. When watched from afar, the almost parallel alignment of our laptop screens and telescope setups look like a strange orchestration of instruments (very much like a scene picked up from S.Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind). Nearby, there were two tree stumps that reached high up into the sky. Instead of being elements of obstruction, they looked almost like tall cacti adapted from Joshua Tree National Park, and proved to be interesting subjects amidst Kelvin's wide Milky Way composures.
After a flurry of setup routines, focusing, calibration, booze, we were quick to start snapping all kinds of objects - from galaxies, to fish-eye Milky Way portraits, to nebulae up-close, to clusters, et cetera. Elton was getting all excited when we told him how good his GM8 was tracking (without much tweaking), and very soon, PHD was getting a good guide graph, and he was happily snapping objects after another. Coming over to Kelvin, this guy was like a wizard conjuring his two setups (to me, it would have been a headache!), and two laptops, capturing two projects at the same time! Talk about squeezing the most out of clear sky time. Seeing him take a very detailed shot of Trifid with the FSQ setup and Rho Ophichus on the other wide-field platform, something inside told me that tonight was different - it was productive (finally). Something that some of us waited almost for a year since, those cloudy trip attempts back in 2010 seem to all disappear, and our internal engines went on through the night without a wink of sleep (or pause!). Moment after moment, music track after another, it was not long before the night finally ended, and all of us had our cameras working for a full 9 hours, doing what they do best, gathering precious bytes of data, clean data infact, that would eventually form our personal magnum opus.
It was rare to have a night like this, with little passing clouds. For the visual observer, it would have been a very special treat, but to the imager, it was a blessing that came probably once in many trip attempts. Everything else, including the good decent food (prepared by the chalet owners), the nice refreshing dip in the sea, and the couple of nice meal treats in town, all made it extra special, and memorable.
I think we should all try to come back and visit this place once again - 1-3 July perhaps?
What a big contrast it was compared to just a day before, with the sun-baked sands, lucious greens, and water-frolicking, all against a wide backdrop of blue hues and warmish breezes.
All of us came with a glimmer of hope, and a dash of positiveness, that perhaps this old site that we used to so very often extract its starry night splendour, could once again encourange us to explore it, use it, with open arms - and sure it did. Almost like sipping a glass of old fine wine...
It was almost dusk when we reached the Mersing site where the new chalets stood. We booked two sea-front units and they were facing east away from the other unit lights further inland. The thin cusp slither of light low in the west immediately caught our attention, and together with the Belt of Venus all encompassing, it looked like a promising start, or even a possible productive night for us imagers. Very quickly, we settled down at the chalets and gobbled down the chicken bits bought from the spanking new KFC in Mersing Town.
Since it was the first time we stayed at these chalets, and with the stars popping out one after another, we quickly decided to pick the spot of clearing beyond the eastern fenced compound, where it was furthest and also shielded from the chalets' light sources. Those other sea-front-facing chalets were pre-occupied but it was not difficult to negotiate with the occupants to have their spotlights turned off later in the night.
Our imaging site was further made more conducive for imaging with tables and chairs, not to mention an abundance of snacks and hot coffee to bring us through the night which was never expected to last in its entirety.
Altogether, there were four primary imaging platforms - Elton's GM8-FS60 inaugural entity, Kelvin's GM8-FSQ85 and GPD-FS60 (yes! operating both at the same time for him was a fun and marvel to watch), and my trusty G11-AP130. With Elton's Bose audio sound-system, it was very nice soothing feel to have clean background music against the Milky Way vistas. When watched from afar, the almost parallel alignment of our laptop screens and telescope setups look like a strange orchestration of instruments (very much like a scene picked up from S.Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind). Nearby, there were two tree stumps that reached high up into the sky. Instead of being elements of obstruction, they looked almost like tall cacti adapted from Joshua Tree National Park, and proved to be interesting subjects amidst Kelvin's wide Milky Way composures.
After a flurry of setup routines, focusing, calibration, booze, we were quick to start snapping all kinds of objects - from galaxies, to fish-eye Milky Way portraits, to nebulae up-close, to clusters, et cetera. Elton was getting all excited when we told him how good his GM8 was tracking (without much tweaking), and very soon, PHD was getting a good guide graph, and he was happily snapping objects after another. Coming over to Kelvin, this guy was like a wizard conjuring his two setups (to me, it would have been a headache!), and two laptops, capturing two projects at the same time! Talk about squeezing the most out of clear sky time. Seeing him take a very detailed shot of Trifid with the FSQ setup and Rho Ophichus on the other wide-field platform, something inside told me that tonight was different - it was productive (finally). Something that some of us waited almost for a year since, those cloudy trip attempts back in 2010 seem to all disappear, and our internal engines went on through the night without a wink of sleep (or pause!). Moment after moment, music track after another, it was not long before the night finally ended, and all of us had our cameras working for a full 9 hours, doing what they do best, gathering precious bytes of data, clean data infact, that would eventually form our personal magnum opus.
It was rare to have a night like this, with little passing clouds. For the visual observer, it would have been a very special treat, but to the imager, it was a blessing that came probably once in many trip attempts. Everything else, including the good decent food (prepared by the chalet owners), the nice refreshing dip in the sea, and the couple of nice meal treats in town, all made it extra special, and memorable.
I think we should all try to come back and visit this place once again - 1-3 July perhaps?
Last edited by rcj on Mon Jun 06, 2011 9:49 pm, edited 1 time in total.
-
shirox
- Posts: 1097
- Joined: Fri Nov 05, 2010 12:21 am
- Favourite scope: Takahashi FSQ85EDX
- Location: Outram
I have already applied my leave for 1-3 and can't wait for the next trip up lol
It was indeed a fantastic night with clear skies thru out.
On the first night i stayed till dawn and was frantically capturing M31 until 1st light.
A side note, watching thru stomp.com, apparently 2nd link requires u to scan your finger prints and on sat night, some was stuck in the jam for more than 5 hours. Definately not something we want as time is money lol.
If i may propose, we can set off early in the friday afternoon 2pm and reaching there would be around 6pm. Just nice for dinner, set up, allign and start shooting lol.
Only thing would be participants would have to apply 1 day leave on fri itself.
What do u think?
It was indeed a fantastic night with clear skies thru out.
On the first night i stayed till dawn and was frantically capturing M31 until 1st light.
A side note, watching thru stomp.com, apparently 2nd link requires u to scan your finger prints and on sat night, some was stuck in the jam for more than 5 hours. Definately not something we want as time is money lol.
If i may propose, we can set off early in the friday afternoon 2pm and reaching there would be around 6pm. Just nice for dinner, set up, allign and start shooting lol.
Only thing would be participants would have to apply 1 day leave on fri itself.
What do u think?
**************************************************************
http://eltonastronomy.blogspot.com/
Mersing finally installed some water sink!
http://eltonastronomy.blogspot.com/
Mersing finally installed some water sink!
Some photos (taken by camera phone, please pardon the quality) from the trip:
Our imaging site at the rear-end of the chalets (facing east)
The Picnic (that housed all our gear plus four persons)
Rear gate that allowed access to our imaging site
One typical light source within the chalet grounds (not of flood-light intensity!) and we could switch more of them off if group was bigger
The drive into our sea-facing chalets
The other chalet units (facing west)
Our dinner
Our imaging site at the rear-end of the chalets (facing east)
The Picnic (that housed all our gear plus four persons)
Rear gate that allowed access to our imaging site
One typical light source within the chalet grounds (not of flood-light intensity!) and we could switch more of them off if group was bigger
The drive into our sea-facing chalets
The other chalet units (facing west)
Our dinner
-
Airconvent
- Super Moderator
- Posts: 5804
- Joined: Tue Sep 30, 2003 11:49 pm
- Location: United Federation of the Planets
![[smilie=cool.gif]](./images/smilies/cool.gif "cool")
-
Canopus Lim
- Posts: 1144
- Joined: Fri Jun 03, 2005 12:46 pm
- Location: Macpherson
Richard: Yes we could see the original site from where we imaged. We could still set up there actually but we needed electricity so decided to stay put near the chalet premises. Bald coconut tree no longer there. 
YB: yes indeed! there was a jam on Friday afternoon at the Woodlands Checkpoint, think we were held up for around 1-2 hours.
YB: yes indeed! there was a jam on Friday afternoon at the Woodlands Checkpoint, think we were held up for around 1-2 hours.