Hitchhiker's Guide to Rukl Chart 5

Aristoteles (JRF <freeman _at_ netcom.com>)

The crater Aristoteles and its smaller companion Eudoxus to the south (Rukl chart 13) are "landmark" features, easily recognized and useful in orientation.

Aristotle (David North <d _at_ timocharis.com>)

The field around Aristotle is peppered with fine craters, much like Copernicus but without the obvious linearity ... they seem more random. Still it's a lovely field when steady. There is no such fine detail around nearby Eudoxus, but there appears to be a semicircular ring of broken rubble and mountains linking the two craters (this may just be the tail of the Caucasus, but it looks like a separate feature. Yet another minor revelation...)

See also Morio Higashida's image of Aristotles.

When the interior is only half lit, the central peaklets and interior ruts are highly visible and extremely interesting.

Baillaud (David North <d _at_ timocharis.com>)

Baillaud ooks tres cool. It's large, flat, and has a perfect "central crater" that caught the light in such a way as to have a pitch dark center and flaring rims.

Meton (David North <d _at_ timocharis.com>)

Meton (along with it's subordinates) makes a weird shape of ruined walled plains that appear to be filled with mare material or some other detritus. The floors are smooth, with only one normal-looking (and small) crater inside. The smoothness was the perfect palette for the curious albedo feature I noted, however: Meton has a "dark ray" inside it, heading roughly westward, with a slight northerly trend. The angle of the "ray" did not correspond to other shadows nearby, so I'm pretty sure it's an albedo feature, but it was nearly as dark as some of the shadows.

Just north of Aristotles, a combination of rises and craters -- notably A & B -- formed an almost perfect "S" shape. The Lunar Snake! Glances at maps are inconclusive as to whether they are hills or domes; their location makes either fairly likely: they could be ejecta blobs, domes formed from the stresses of impact... beats me. Striking "asterism," though.

Rima Sheepshanks (David North <d _at_ timocharis.com>)

Rima Sheepshanks was uncharacteristically elusive tonight; I have found it easily in the past, and had to really work for it, only getting sections at a time. The seeing seemed good, so I guess this is a trick of the light at this libration and angle.

Rima Eudoxus (David North <d _at_ timocharis.com>)

One last "discovery" for the night, and a curious one indeed: slightly west of Eudoxus can be found (with some difficulty) Rima Eudoxus 1. It was very difficult if at all possible tonight (I'm not calling a clean kill), but very obvious was an odd "ray" system in precisely that place. The shorter ray paralleled the rima and seemed to engulf it in places, and there was another running almost perpendicular (mostly south with a slight tendency to the west) from the point closest to Eudoxus (they joined to form a V). I could see no cause (crater or other feature) for these stripes, nor could I find any record of them or any causal agent on my charts.