Hawksmoor

Nice night with some high level cloud passing by. Just got back from Southend so a bit tired and the old back is playing up again. Going out with big bins for an easy hour - long eyeball trip around the Universe.  According to Metcheck Thursday and Friday night will be mega -clear so will leave scopes and astro photography until the end of the week. I will also feel a tad less sore and more 'perky' by then.

One hour later

What a lovely hour under the stars - hope I'm not going to regret keeping my scopes in their boxes - paticularly if the weather does not oblige at the end of the week.

Spent some time gazing at the Andromeda Galaxy through my bins. When your eyes get 'dark sensitive' you gradually begin to appreciate how big it really is. Virtually fills the width of the FOV in my 11x80mm. binoculars!

Also noticed the 'stick-man' asterism next to the Double Cluster for the first time. How have I missed seeing that before?

Had a long look around Cassiopeia and Cepheus lots of clusters and nebulosity. Herschel's Garnet Star - Mu Cephei  is a very pretty thing and very hard to believe that it is very probably larger than Betelgeuse and spacious enough to contain 2 billion Suns within its volume.

Looking over to the South and West - M17 was very easy to spot with my bins - a bright elongated nebulous patch at the bottom and to the west of Scutum.  A very pretty section of the sky to scan with binoculars if a little close to my horizon. 

The globular clusters in Hercules were still high enough in the sky to see well and Cygnus and Lyra were more or less directly over head. Always enjoy looking at the double -double stars in Lyra although unable to split each pair of stars using my bins. I have managed this before with both my 90mm. Mak and my 127mm. refractor. The bins just dont have sufficient magnification for the job.

Looked at the Coathanger Cluster before I called it a day and came back inside to finish this report  before heading off to bed.

Nighty night stargazers from

George 'the old man by the sea' in Lowestoft.

Terrible night in Lowestoft. In the short time it takes me to walk from my kitchen to the shed I became fully immersed by rain in stair-rod formation. Checked that the LVST was still monitoring meteor activity over southern France. All OK but not much radar on  plasma action. The sky over the Jodrell Plank Observatory was coal black and robbed of all light.   I wasn't expecting to encounter a Balrog in Suffolk - thought they were native to Moria. 

George the Grey now at his bed in  a moist and soggy East Anglia.

Just returned home after a day out in Wells next the Sea with friends, Moon followed us all the way home nearly full and quite beautiful peeking between diffuse 'rainbow' clouds.

Night all

Early night to night as I did not get into my bed until 3.30 am. this morning. Great night last night - 4 hours  11.00pm. until 3.00 am cloud free.  Clouds rolled in just as my battery died - good timimg.  Saw the ISS pass overhead at about 9.30pm. always a treat  and just before I packed up I  saw two bright meteors simultaneously - coming from the same radiant almost due south. Tremendous visual perspective effect.

Good call to get my scope out tonight. Lots of stars over Lowestoft. Two in the morning and my camera is still clicking - hope the battery doesn't die on me as all the kit is behaving itself up to now. Clouds haven't rolled in yet either. 

George not in bed yet in Suffolk.

I should moan about the weather more often. Been terrible all day but just now I've been treated to the most transparent and steady summer sky I've ever experienced over our back yard in July. I could see M31 with the naked eye even though it was still quite low in the east. Similarly I could see M33 through my big bins but hand held. Vega, Altair and Deneb were so bright that the summer triangle looked 3d. I'm pretty sure that bins and averted vision allowed me to spot the tiny blur of M57 in Lyra. Could also see M71 in Sagittarius and M27 in Vulpecula. Along the way I picked up nice views of the big two globular clusters in Hercules, the Coathanger and the double cluster in Perseus.

In my bins I could follow the Milky Way right down to the rooftops on our southern boundary. Generally interesting fuzziness in this area of the sky just disappears into the murk and light pollution but not tonight, I could easily pick out all the Messiers  down through Scutum  and Ophiuchus until the roof tops met Sagittarius.

Finished off a rewarding 35 minutes with a nice meteor and several bright satellites.

No telescope action and no photography but what a great, if breathtakingly short, night of old fashioned stargazing.

Hope you all enjoyed some clear skies where ever you are.

Night night from George happy in bed Lowestoft.

Funny sort of day in Lowestoft. Had sunshine and rain and thought there was little chance of stargazing. Anyway, coming to bed just after the the street lights go out, I always out of habit check out the sky over the old backyard and low and behold tonight there were stars

So I grab my big bins and managed 15 minutes before the clouds started forming. What a great 15 minutes too. Sky was proper dark The milky way was visible from horizon to horizon. I managed to see The Veil and M27, not always a given through bins from my backyard and I think the globular M58 (if so a first for me with bins). Best of all ,just before cloud o' clock , an absolutely splendid slow moving white and very bright meteor travelling  from east to west and from my perspective at the same Dec as Altair.  I'm now in bed happy and ready for sleep.

Astronomy is great even in small discrete parcels, much like photons in fact.

Nighty-night stargazers where ever you are.

George under starry skies tonight in Suffolk.

Spectrometer Mk3 has moved on a bit - started to put the separate parts together and in a '4 year old kid with a new toy' sort of way I could not resist poking the fibre optic cable out the window and squinting down the camera end of the beast. Low and behold when I inserted the 0.15mm. slit and 600 line/mm. grating I could see a small displaced but definite continuous spectrum. Will it actually work? - "Tension mounts and then gets off again"

Sheds is off tomorrow as we have visitors - but maybe at the weekend ?

George 'ever so slightly excited' in Lowestoft

Just opened my Sky at Night Magazine and noticed your fine image of Saturn is 'Photo of the Month'. Well done and well deserved - a beautiful and detailed image.

best regards from  George

Spent an hour or so in the shed on the ongoing 'Spectrometer Mk3' build.  I'm not convinced this  'Heath Robinson' contraption of mine is going to work but hey-ho - I've started so I'm going to finish.  On a slightly more positive note, this particular DIY journey into the unknown has been relatively inexpensive and the bits I have purchased are easily recyclable for more and the equally pointless future projects with which I am determined to fill my ongoing retirement from gainfull enterprise.  One of the minor benefits of being a compulsive hoarder and inveterate tinkerer is a shed full of stuff.

I really like stuff and sheds, stuff in sheds and sheds with stuff in 'em. My shed runneth over with stuff! Thats why I've got two sheds!

George in Oulton Broad sitting on a sofa contemplating the philosophy of 'stuff in sheds' and the imminent possibility of Pizza .

The Observatory is looking good Jim! Nice kit too!

George

Not really dark but had a pleasant 45 minutes in the backyard hand holding my big 11x80 bins. Quick sweep through Cygnus and Lyra. Couldn't identify M56.  Summer triangle always a beautiful naked eye asterism to view and the starfields around Sadr in my bins never disappoint.

Saturn just visible between the rooftops and very yellow, couldn't pick out Titan. Neither could I find M10 or M12 in Ophiuchus as sky quite murky low to the south.  By contrast, M13, M92 and M5 all easy spots. 

Now in bed ready to surf the realm of the unconscious.

Night night stargazers wherever you are.

• George zzzzzzzzzzzzzz Lowestoft