Well that was a good night!boabove Antares

[ollypenrice]

Sure, we have good skies here but, like anywhere else, there can be particularly exceptional ones, as last night, with both the transparency and seeing being at a heady level of perfection.

We started with the 20 inch Dob on Jupiter. Normally this wouldn't be first choice for planets but it was out and cooled. The GRS was simply sharper and clearer than I've ever seen it and there was a crisp shodow transit thrown in for free. The image was rock steady at 158x in the 13 Ethos which we left in there because of the long nudge-free dwell it provides. This is a bonus when sharing a scope. Later on we managed Satrun at very low elevation above Antares. Too low to be great but we could see Cassini's.

I haven't observed M3 for a few years and in the same combination it was a real stunner. (Lucky, too, because when I just estimated its position in the Telrad it was in the EP, making me look clever when in fact it was pure flook...  ) It was far more satisfying than I remember it and was starry to the core and full of delicious glitter. It was easy as a soft star in the 8x42 bins, too.

M51, spiral structure clear as a bell. I also found it in the 8x42s*, which is a first for me, not that I've ever spent ages trying. Spiral structure in M101 even though it wasn't particularly high and the bright patches in two opposing arms showed well. Bode's was full of dust lane detail and the dust lane ran sharply along the lower edge of the Sombrero. The Virgo Cluster just makes you chuckle because it so ridiculously rich in galaxies. (Meanwhile the Tec/Avalon/Atik 11000 was doing its thing on Markarians's Chain. That ran sweetly all night.)

Later on the MW bagan to clear the horizon in the NE and made us think of summer. We caught the Ring in Tree Skimmer mode and enjoyed the Great Rift as it emerged a couple of hours before dawn.

Ho hum, it's a hard life!

Olly

*Edit. I mean I found M51 in the bins, not spiral structure!

[Peter Drew]

Flook? wasn't that a cartoon character along with Rufus. 

[ollypenrice]

Flook? wasn't that a cartoon character along with Rufus. 

I'm too young to remember, Peter!

(And if you believe that...)

Olly

[cotterless45]

Neat report, we do a lot of hedge and tree skimming to get views south. I still think that Newts can give the best planetary views,

Nick.

[neural]

Lovely to read, thanks Olly. M3 may not have been a complete fluke... at this time of year, at least at sensible times of the evening, Cor Caroli is vertically above Arcturus and the glob in question is precisely midway between them. But you knew that I'm sure :-)

Under my home skies, there's not much I could see that I can't see with my ED100. (Chara was only just visible naked-eye tonight.) The one thing that really gives me aperture fever is that I would love to resolve a globular cluster, so thanks for adding pepper to that itch!

[Scooot]

Nice read Olly, I'd have liked to look through your 20" on this night in particular, it must have been tremendous.

[bish]

Can't tell you how jealous I am that you have a 20" and great skies. I must save up and to come and stay at your place!