Copernicus in the morning:
I didn't want to neglect Luna, so I grabbed a shot of the rayed crater Copernicus in between the clouds. Copernicus is probably the most observed crater on the moon, since rays of ejecta make it a visible bright spot with the unaided eye.
Northeast, where the curved ridge of the Apenninus mountains comes to a point, is a medium large crater, Eratosthenenes. Look closely between the two large craters (straight up from Eratosthenese), and you will see, just barely, a faint outline of Stadia, a crater buried in lava.
An ancient degraded crater, Fra Mauro, on the shore of the Sea of Knowledge, can be found in the top left corner of this picture. Apollo 14 landed on the edge of this crater in 1971.
The picture was handheld at 1/30 second through the Schwaar telescope and a 12 mm Nagler eyepiece. My six inch dobsonian scope is named Schwaar because a guy named Pierre Schwaar made it. Pierre's a craftsman who believes the primary mirror is critical:
He even signed it:
Check the warning above the signature. I won't be making Galileo's mistake.
I turned trackbacks off, cause there were incoming links, but nothing showed up in the t/b window.
I went shopping today:
In addition to appeasing my inner history buff, Wade Rowland's book will help me to "blog responsibly" next time I talk about science and religion. At twenty seven bucks Wade, it'd better!
I hope the filter will reveal more detail near the southern polar ice cap of Mars.
Speaking of comments, I just heard on the radio that Arnold will (!) run.
Sorry wKen.
