Fedoras afield

[RJR]

Great pics.

 

[hatsRme]

Looks like a really super time, guys. Thanks for the great shots, Mike!!

 

[dh66]

Man, what a great way to spend a day! Awesome pics Mike.

 

[Tedquinton]

Looks like you had a very 'hatty' day!

Great pics. As I've said many times before, I love this thread.

 

[Rogera]

Great shots Mike! Looks like a great time. I could get lost and never return with all those hats about!

 

[1mach1]

Really nice, Mike. Looks like a great time!

 

[mikespens]

Glad you all enjoyed the pixs, really special to be able to share the experience with those with the sickness too

 

[seabass]

Great Hat Party !

 

[mikespens]

You gotta come to one Che!

 

[dh66]

Observacion de Dias de Los Muertos, Birmingham, Alabama. 2 Nov, 2014

 

[mikespens]

Now that's festive Dale. Looks like a grand time.

 

[Chepstow]

Fantastic photos my friends! Great to see you all well up.

 

[alanfgag]

Great spread Dale. Mike, I love seeing these photos of your visits with Garrett and Bob.

Thanks for taking us along, guys.

 

[alanfgag]

A few photos from my recent trip to Tucson. Had an early Stratoliner and a depression era cap with me.

My friend Adam Block invited a few of us up to his Sky Center on Mount Lemmon. It sits at 9200 feet and is open to the public. In addition to running the visitor center where people get to look through some very large telescopes, Adam is one of the top astro-photographers in the world. He has more than 70 NASA APODs to his credit. Here he is attaching his camera to the focuser of the 32" Schulman telescope.

We tested the atmospheric stability with a quick look at the moon. It was pretty steady.
I held my iPhone to the eyepiece for a quick souvenir.

Adam took this photo of me in front of the 60 inch telescope used by the Catalina Sky Survey.

Here is the control room for the CSS. It runs every day, searching a section of the sky for near earth objects hunting for possible impactors. The monitor at lower right was running a discovery image of an asteroid found five minutes earlier. It had already been sent for trajectory analysis which is made available to the public at the same time.

This is Ray from Ottawa... he was displaying his solar photography with public visitors who were able to look through a myriad of solar telescopes set up in front of the Tucson Convention Center.

These events are great opportunities to see old friends and meet new ones. To my left is retired astronaut Ed Gibson who did many missions on Skylab. He once lived just outside of Buffalo. To my right is one of the Meteorite Men from the self titled series on the Science Channel. Geoff Notkin has won two Emmy awards and has a fabulous personal collection of meteorites. I bought my first from him at the expo. It looks small, but it's 95% iron and weighs in at 3.1 kilos. The depressions are artifacts of ablation as the rock interacted with intense heat and pressure on its ride through the atmosphere. This particular rock is part of the Campo Del Cielo meteorite which fell 4-5 thousand years ago in Argentina. It is 4.5 billion years old or thereabouts. A friend said "whatever...my whole planet is that old."

I always take a window seat on the plane ride home.

 

[mayserwegener]

Alan, Fantastic photos! The meteorite is amazing! Same with the moon photo!

 

[RJR]

Very interesting and informative,thanks.

 

[Joao Encarnado]

Amazing Alan!

 

[dh66]

Awe inspiring trip Alan. Thanks for sharing it!

 

[1mach1]

Great photos, Alan!

 

[Zombie_61]

...My friend Adam Block invited a few of us up to his Sky Center on Mount Lemmon...

Some guys have all the luck.

...I held my iPhone to the eyepiece for a quick souvenir.

What a beautiful photo! I believe Mr. Aldrin got it right when he described the surface of the moon as "Magnificent desolation". Thank you for sharing!