On Saturday night, I rendezvoused with Candy, her brother, and a friend, about 10:45 p.m., and we traveled out in tandem to Latrobe: specifically, outside their elementary school ( as Candy discovered via Google, a favored spot by local meteor watchers) in order to watch the 2012 Perseid meteor shower. Once we arrived, we were joined by another friend and his dog (a yippy-type dog, oddly-named Hippo) who had traveled all the way from San Jose(!) We lay down on sleeping bags on the gravel, faced northeast, and started watching for fireworks.
We ate potato chips and cookies, and drank hot chocolate (since she wasn't driving, Candy drank vino). It was party time! Hippo walked all over us as we lay on the near the road across from the elementary school. Candy's academic Cal-Tech-type friends were fun company. Very civilized.
Sky-wise, things got off to a slow start, and seemed to slow down with time. Sure, there some meteors - some good! - but they were few and far between. There were even some normal-type meteors heading in the opposite direction, from the southwest.
After awhile, I realized we were missing some meteors in the southwest sky, so I turned around and faced that direction. Didn't help THAT much!
Slowly, the crescent moon rose, with Venus, Jupiter, and the Pleiades. We could hear a cow mooing in the distance, and coyotes barking and howling in the even remoter distance. A child babbled from a camper vehicle not far from us in the dark.
About 2:30 a.m., we called it a night. No photos (the meteors were just too unreliable). We returned home, and reflected. (I can't believe the fellow drove all the way from San Jose!)
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