Astronomy was my previous "phase".
Sold my telescopes to buy guitars.
?
As suggested already, the best initial telescope is actually a good pair of binoculars.
Then ... join the Astronomical Society.
They meet in Observatory every Wednesday night at 20h00.
Their members have some fairly decent telescopes ... so you join them on some "dark sky" nights and get to look through their stuff.
http://www.capecentre.org.za/
Then, if you do want to buy, research and research.
http://www.cloudynights.com/
There is a massive 2nd hand market in the US.
http://www.astromart.com/
Some unexpected findings after you try out astronomy:
- the moon is nice to look at ... once or twice. Then it's an annoying very bright object which threatens to fry the back of your eyeballs
- a star is a point of light. No matter how much you magnify it, it is still a point of light. It doesn't get more interesting.
- related to the above, magnification is not the goal. Getting more (sharp) light is the goal. Some of the best images are at 20x magnification
- if you want to see images like Hubble takes, then look at Hubble images. You will NOT see those through a telescope
- anything you see with even expensive equipment is grey, colourless and unimpressive. It is less impressive than you think
- except the Orion nebula. That is impressive. And some clusters.
- Astronomy happens at night. When it is cold. When you'd normally be sleeping. I never actually realized the full impact of this until I started doing it
- Seeing the rings of Saturn for the first time with your own eyes is a religious experience. I don't know why. It just is.
- You can make your own! There are people at the society who can help you
I had a 7 year old 2nd hand Televue 101 which was a high end refractor. Cost me $ 2,000 (without a mount).
http://www.company7.com/books/products/thenextstep.html
That is the actual telescope in the picture which I bought from the chap in the picture.
I didn't buy the mount - that mount is a lot more expensive than this telescope!
I also had a Stellarvue NightHawk which I bought 2nd hand for about R 3,000 from the same chap.
He bought it as a finder scope and didn't like it. Ha ha.
It was a very good buy and worked very well.
http://www.cloudynights.com/item.php?item_id=1805
My friend has a Meade LX200 which comes with a mount.
He paid about R 25,000 for it a long time ago.
Last time Mars was close we had fun.
Took a video of Mars with an adapted Webcam ... and processed the image using software called Registax.
We got this image which we regarded as astonishing.
Much better than anything we could see directly.
http://s602.beta.photobucket.com/user/nev-wiz/media/mars-230903-4-1.jpg.htm]
http://s602.beta.photobucket.com/user/nev-wiz/media/mars-230903-4-1.jpg.html]
http://s602.beta.photobucket.com/user/nev-wiz/media/mars-230903-4-1.jpg.htm
Most expensive telescopes sit unused in cupboards.
My most pleasant astonomy views have been lying on my back on the ground with a good pair of 8x42 binoculars.
