Good night with the scope tonight

[DougM43]

While setting up the scope tonight just before dark the lady next door spotted me and asked what I was doing, she was quite surprised when I told her, it surprised me also because on the nosey neighbour scale I would put her at an 8 or 9. Anyway it turned out her daughter teaches astronomy at the school she works at and as it happens she was over at her mums with her three youngsters for tea, suffice to say after dark they all came round for a look through the scope, I could just fit the full moon into the 32mm eyepiece and the kids loved it. It's surprising how heavy a six year old gets when you have to hold them up to an eyepiece and they won't let you put them down. Jupiter although still quite low didn't disappoint either even though I could only get a stable image at 62x the moons were all strung out and the two main cloud bands stood out well, the neighbours daughter was amazed at Jupiter, it turned out she had never looked through a telescope before and once we eventually managed to pry her eyeball from the scope she began showing the kids (and me) all the different constellations and she knew lots of star names, M42 was the next target, although Orion's sword was washed out by the moon the nebula was clearly visible through the scope, another half an hour went by while everyone took a look.

So all in all a good night, the kids went home to look at pictures of space, the lady next door now knows what I'm up too in the garden in the dark and her daughter is off to tell her husband she wants a telescope.

Selfish as it may sound though, the best part was after they had gone and there was just me the telescope and the night sky.

[AstroDC]

Sounds like a good night! Jupiter was impressive tonight - moons were nicely separated and two cloud bands were clear (even through my modest 114mm) even though it was quite washed out by the bright moon. Upshot though was that the moon was great viewing

[uhb1966]

Sounds like a perfect night!!!:-)

[RWB]

Hi Doug43 it does beg the question 

How can you teach astronomy with out having ever looked at the stars properly

I must admit that my knowledge of the constellations is very weak (understatement)

but I suppose books can contain a lot of information (note to self learn to read )

well done and many more good nights viewing

Regards and C.Ss

Robin