Scouts and 4th Graders 4/27-28 and 4/30/01I had the opportunity to camp with the scouts Pack 43 (webelos), Pack 12 (webelos), and troop 12 at Carter Caves State Park 4/27-29/01. I took the 10" and 6" Discovery Dobs. On Friday and Saturday night I showed them the moon, Mizar and Alcor, the beehive and M67. After going through 3 caves (one of them twice – return trip) where we slogged through cold water and crawled in the mud, we rinsed off in the creek (also cold). While the boys dried off, I set up the 6" and 10" dobs with Baader film solar filters on their finders and the scopes and we looked at sun spots. Friday night one boy (John, a webelo from Pack 43) stayed up with me and we used the 6” to track down galaxies in Leo and Virgo until 12 midnight. We saw M65 and 66. I didn’t try to "id" the G’s in Virgo – only find them. I was amazed at the ability of young eyes to see. I had him describe what he saw so I know that he saw them. We finished with M53 the GC in CB. You know, one interested scout made schleping out all that equipment worth while. On 4/30/01 OVAS went to the elementary school in Chesapeake Ohio with the scopes. Dave Richards, Don Kemper, Rodger Blake, Paul Brown, and that new guy, John Walker-Wilson! (Inside joke on that last one.) We looked at Saturn (hard to find down in the trees), Jupiter, the moon, Mizar/Alcor, and Polaris. The moon and street lights prevented the identification of any star clusters. The boys (i.e. OVAS) stayed out to gab long after the students left. That made for a nice end to the night. And as a bonus we got to meet Don’s wife Jo. Channel 3 put us on for about5-10 seconds before the weather so the club got mini "pr".
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