BAA Winchester Weekend

2022 Apr 8 - 2022 Apr 10

A grand total of 16 members from CMHASD attended the weekend and a good time was had by all.  There was observing on both nights too and a superb presentation to the BAA by 2 CMHASD members.

Below is some information about the weekend from the BAA website, followed by a slideshow of the first submission of photos taken by members as well as Marc Gray & Pauline Philips of the BAA.

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7 members of the society attended the Kelling Heath Autumn Equinox Star Party, some booking camping pitches and others static caravans. The weather was overcast with showers with long dry spells and whilst the astronomical observations were very limited between clouds it was still a great event which I'd recommend any keen observers try to book.

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Gary organised a trip to Rochester Cathedral to view the huge 3D moon that is touring the UK and to hear a lecture on the moon. 

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4 Members and 2 ex-Members travelled to the Kelling Heath Star Party, this star party has notoriously poor weather, but on this occasion we were blessed with reasonable views on Wednesday night and clear skies from dusk 'till dawn on Thursday Night, Friday Morning.

Many, many objects were observed with Keith's 10" Dobsonian and Simon's 12" Truss Dobsonian, Julian and another Simon both allowed us to view objects with their 20" Dob's. 

Apparently the food was epic...

Auriga

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Camp Site

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Mist on Sunday

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13 Members made the annual pilgrimage to Sparsholt College for the BAA Winchester Weekend.

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1st to 3rd April 2016.

A total of 10 members of CMHASD attended the 50th BAA Winchester Weekend meeting this year & members enjoyed a weekend of good food, company, lectures, walks and some solar observing.

John Mason had members in stitches on Saturday afternoon reminiscing about Winchester - the early years. During his talk he spoke of Newbury and Crayford's partying antics :-) he also spoke about John Wall and the huge refractor's he used to build in his garden.

Below are some photos from the weekend.

Thank you to members Diane Clarke, John Sowle, Jim Burchell & Honor Wheeler for taking the photos.

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Kelling Heath Spring Star Party 2015

Six members of CMHASD attended the Kelling Heath Spring star party this year and a jolly good time was had by all.

Highlights and funny moments of the trip include; a banjo, a snake, a rubber egg (you will have to ask the members about this), decorating thermos cups with glow in the dark stars and any other object which members felt 'needed' a few stars stuck on it to see it in the dark ;-).  Visiting Red & Ginger the two red squirrels who live at Kelling Heath and the members being told AGAIN they were making too much noise which I think the late Dick Chambers would have been proud of :-)

Unfortunately no observing involving imaging was done as the weather let members down by the time it got dark on all nights and so members watched films & had a good time relaxing in their tent instead. Members did however manage one night to quickly view a few of the Messier objects on member Keith Rickard's 10'' Dobsonian which pleased them.

During the days however, it was fine with plenty of sunshine but it was quite windy which meant doing any solar imaging during the day was going to be a struggle - so visual solar observing was done, viewing the several sunspots on the Sun. Members were lucky though, as they did get to view an absolutely stunning prominence, that wrapped itself around the edge of the Sun on Martin's set up - just a shame it was far too windy for him to image it.

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Several CMHASD members joined members of the Orpington Astronomical Society and took a very long trip to Jodrell Bank on the 15th June 2013. Below are a couple of photos and a great presentation put together by member Honor Wheeler of the day.

Below is a slide show of the presentation written by Honor Wheeler of the day

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Three members of CMHASD attended the BAA Chichester meeting back in April 2013. It was held at the South Downs Planetarium, Chichester and hosted by Dr John Mason MBA of the BAA.

Below are a selection of photos taken by member Jim Burchell of that day.

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Set in the Sussex countryside Mullard Space Science Laboratory (MSSL) a world-leading space science laboratory and home to Guilford AS held an open day and we were invited along.

15 members attended the Mullard Space Labs open day hosted by UCL.  It was a good day with a nice meal in a local pub afterwards. Displays included making a comet, rocket launches and a Mars rover. There were also solar telescopes from Gillford AS and a tour of their observatory which houses a 20.5" telescope for visual work and a couple of refractors for imaging.

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