I went to the Wedge Friday night thinking that others would be there. Being alone gave me a chance to get my new 20 200+ lbs scope out and into my van. Thank goodness all went well. I guess I took a chance going to the Wedge for First Light with my new TeleKit not even knowing if the trusses were the right length and no tube cutter. Everything turned out great. It would have been fun to share it with you all who I have come to really enjoy being around. I got setup as the sun was going down. I am pretty amazed that the folks at TeleKit got the balance right and the truss tube length right - right off the bat. When I put my Lumicon finder, my Telrad and my Nagler 31mm (aka the grenade) in place everything moved like oil. I had practice collimating the scope at home so I had it down for my first outing with the scope. Once I got the finder and the Telrad calibrated with the scope on Arcturus low in the west we were all set but had to wait for darkness. I began to wonder what should be my first object. As I conjured up a list of candidate, I soon saw Sagittarius so I just went for M8 the Lagoon Nebula. I then dropped down to the nice cluster M7 and then began working my way up the Milky Way; M54, M69, M70, M28, M22, M8 you know the drill all the way up to the double cluster. TeleKit has a great feature in its filter slider; it can hold 3 or four filters all at once. I put in a UHC and an OII filter and when I found M16 the Eagle Nebula I observed through both filters and back to clear. It was interesting and fun. I did the same thing on the Vial Nebula; that was really neat. I could see different things from clear to UHC to OIII. Then I followed the arm along. I had not noticed how long that thing is before. I went to all the old familiar favorites. Even though M51 was quite low in the sky I could see its structure very will. With the 31mm Nagler I could just barely get M81&M82 in one eye view. I puttered around Cassiopeia for a while; M52, M103 NGC 281 wasnt too impressive. I found M72, M2 and M30. M2 was so full and beautiful; what a magnificent cluster. If I remember right (I left my notes in the car) M2 as 5 strands of stars like arms sticking out. If it wasnt M2, it was one of the others. I found the Saturn nebula and it was quite large and a greenish blue and the wings that look like saturns rings was quite visible. Then to the East I checked out M38, M36, M37, then after a while M1. M31 through the 31mm Nagler was fantastic. I couldnt see the whole thing but I could see the bright central core, the dust lane and its companion galaxies M32 and M110 by moving the scope a touch. In fact I could see M31 with the unaided eye as I went back to it several times; I just put the Telrad on this fuzzy spot and peered through the eyepiece and there it was. I did use other eyepieces and every thing focused well down to the 9mm Ortho. I did use the 7mm Nagler but I mention the 9mm Ortho because of the different focusing requirements for the small compact lens compared to the 31mm Nagler. The only thing lacking were friends, otherwise I had a great time under great skies. The temperature must have been in the 50s because I only needed a light jacket not even buttoned. JG --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? vote.yahoo.com - Register online to vote today!