We did a repeat of our 2023 anniversary / dark skies trip this year, when Mother Nature again vetoed our planned high-country (a.k.a. cool enough weather in August to camp comfortably in the Beast) dark skies trip and only provided a single night of clear skies at the Comanche National Grasslands (SE Colorado where the temperature was 100+ degrees). I spent a night imaging from (and sleeping in) the Expedition while Paul and Zeus stayed in the nearby Cobblestone Inn; then we drove to Albuquerque for a special celebration of our 38th wedding anniversary and Zeus’ 10th anniversary “Gotcha Day”
One night in hot, clear, dark skies…
In a repeat of our 2023 anniversary / and take what you can get dark skies adventure (https://beersastrophotography.com/photography-journals/beersastrophotography-dark-skies-adventure-series-august-2023/) I spent one night imaging from (and sleeping in) the Beast in Springfield, Colorado while Zeus and Paul stayed at the Cobblestone Inn about 5 miles away (in the blissful air conditioning). Specifically, I imaged from Comanche National Grasslands public land on a spot about half a mile south of US Hwy 160 off County Road 24.3.
I’d originally planned to capture a new target – B144 Fish on a Platter – but when we got to the imaging spot to check it out after arriving in Springfield during the early afternoon, I was reminded of the windmill adjacent to the point where I was planning to image. B144 was going to require a 2-tile mosaic that set below 15° at about 0515MDT. I was concerned B144 was going to set into the windmill – so I decided I would save the Fish for another time and spend the night imaging IC1396 Elephant Trunk. IC1396 (even more so with the addition of the 0.7x reducer in my FRA600’s imaging stream) only required a single frame and was going to be high in the sky all night long.
Apparently, the Elephant Trunk has become my go-to target (unintentionally) during imaging from the Comanche National Grasslands! I had imaged IC1396 from this same spot in 2023, but I had forgotten to bring the correct attachment ring for my autoguider, so I didn’t capture the best data that night. I’d forgotten that I had also imaged IC1396 during our October 2024 dark skies trip to Picture Canyon in the Comanche National Grasslands. The 2023 and 2024 versions – surprisingly, not looking too much different. Guess I should “move on” to other “late summer” targets, eh? The gallery post of all the iterations of IC1396 Elephant Trunk Nebula is: https://beersastrophotography.com/gallery/ic1396-elephant-trunk-nebula/
…and while I’m out here, I might as well image the Milky Way
After I got the Southern Cross (with it’s new 0.7x reducer) going on the Elephant Trunk, I simultaneously captured a couple hours of 15 second exposures of a most spectacular Milky Way with the Canon EOS Ra with 14mm lens on the tripod. That image is below, and the gallery post is: https://beersastrophotography.com/gallery/milky-way-over-springfield-colorado/
