Date: Wed, 21 Jul 1999 22:59:05 EDT
From: MWLSTAR@aol.com
To: spider@seds.org
Subject: messier marathon

after using your guide (actually I thing Herr Formut had a lot of input) I 
attempted amy first marathon just south of peru, indiana, on march 20th past. 
I must confess to cheating as I have an LX-200 of the 8" variety, and figured 
to do quite well. as dusk settled I had no problem with the western group (M 
74 and such), but could only detect a faint glop of light on anything 8.5 or 
fainter. the sky was dark by my standards, but far from what I hope to have 
next march 11 on top of Clingman's Dome in the Smoky mountains. last march 
the rangers types would not open the road, maybe next year they will. anyway, 
back to the marathon. the objects "up north " were better for viewing, and I 
soon found after 3 hours I had nailed 52 objects. in for a cup of coffee and 
a snack to revive myself , I returned to the scope to find Mr. Frost had 
completely covered the corrector plate. I finished the rest  of the marathon  
about a month ago, but did not have nearly as dark a sky and couldn't see M 
83. but  108 out of 109 ain't bad.