When we made the weather go/no go call Friday morning, the skies were clear and the day looked promising. But, by the time the cars were loaded and we started toward Freeport it was lightly raining. Once on site we re-evaluated the possibility of having a productive star gaze. It was very cloudy but there were blue skies to the south so we rolled the dice and kept going. Tom Haugh set up the projector and started the NWFAA solar presentation to the 66 or so students and teachers. Meanwhile outside, Dean Covey and Dennis & Marietta Hausch started to set up their scopes. They had to quickly cover the equipment as it started to rain again, but it stopped and they finished readying the equipment. By the time Tom’s presentation completed, the clouds cleared the students were treated to 3 different views of the Sun.
 Students line up for Dean’s H-alpha scope. |
 There were no sunspots visible in Dennis’ white light telescope. |
 Tom’s spectroscope shows a colorful view of the Sun. |
 Lots of students under the hot Sun. |
We would like to thank the Freeport SPICE coordinators for the invitation to share our enthusiasm of Astronomy with their students. We also thank Marietta Hausch for her constant support and event photography.