Hawksmoor

Glad I popped outside before I went to bed tonight! Really clear sky at the moment in Lowestoft.  Tonight, even before the street lights went out, I could see M44 with the naked eye as quite a bright cloud. Got a real grip on its apparent size with regard to the constellation Cancer, as much easier to do with unaided eye sight. When I looked at it through my 11x80 bins a real treat -lots of stars on view. Bonus - M67 a very easy spot  with handheld bins tonight - not always the case from my backyard.

Looking west was fantastic. Orion, Gemini, Taurus, Auriga and Perseus all visible in one view without having to move my head absolutely fabulous. One off treats that stood out - Sirius, Orion's Sword, Betelgeuse, Aldeberan, the Pleiades and Capella. Through my bins the open clusters in Gemini and Auriga were top notch and the view of the Orion GMC was stunning.

Looking south, Leo on display always nice to see - spring on its way. The Bear remains on its tail and Arcturus was shining yellow as it rose above my tall hedge to the east.

My wife came out to have a look and spotted a meteor.

Nighty night stargazers wherever you are.

George in Lowestoft about to turn out the light.

Interesting evening under starry skies in Redgrave, Suffolk. Sat next to a guy in the pub who played an officer on the Death Star in the first Star Wars film. Fell three feet into a sunken garden in the dark. Luckily the earth 's crust broke my fall. Survived to tell the tale and now back in bed in Lowestoft.

 George shaken but not stirred in Lowestoft

My word the early hours of this morning in our backyard were very very cold, so cold that my laptop stopped working properly! Didn't get to bed until 5:30am but enjoyed seeing a fine lunar eclipse. By and large the clouds stayed away until 5:00am. so cannot complain.

George contemplating an early night in Lowestoft

Metcheck currently predicting clear skies for the lunar eclipse as seen from Lowestoft. Very excited! At the moment it is -3 C outside. Hope it warms up a bit in the next 24 hours or I will be hitting the hot marmite quite hard by the time it reaches totality.?

George in preparation, looking for his mittens in Lowestoft

Whoo hoo! we had stars in Lowestoft last night. ?  Not sure what was to blame for the dodgy images, was it the bad weather/Christmas lay-off affecting my kit or was the old astronomer using it  to blame? 

Got out the 66mm Altair refractor on the Star Adventurer and my trusty bins , didn't get to bed until 3:30am.  Anyway I have a few more blurry images of 46P/ Wirtanen and I think I managed to capture a smudge that might be 38P/Stephan-Oterma. Could see 46P through my 11x80 bins handheld but very diffuse and cloud like would have missed it 'sweeping' but knew where to look. 38P not visible through my bins even though I knew where it should be, however the mince-pies aren't what they used to be.

Real nice treat - saw a very bright and orange coloured meteor - slow moving in the east comiing from the direction of Orion.  No it wasn't a flare or firework!

Nice clear night and dark after the Moon set, M81 and M82 very easy handheld through my big bins.

George tired but quite content in Lowestoft.

Weather remains inclement. Spent the day, off and on, assembling 3d printer kit. Off to bed as no stars and have just finished watching Modus, some violence, moderate swearing and a preposterous story line.

Nighty night stargazers from George in Lowestoft

All Christmas decorations taken down and put away but still no stars in Lowestoft.?

Happy New Year to all Stargazers and chums around the world. My new year resolution is to try and treat the Earth and all life on it a little better in 2019.

George now back in Lowestoft (it's still cloudy)

Merry Christmas Stargazers

from George in Lowestoft

Nice waxing gibbous  moon shrouded in hazy high level cloud over Lowestoft tonight. Watched a plane and its vapour trail fly silently past. The jet condensate illuminated by moonlight shone pale yellow against the dark grey sky. Made me feel sad, I don't know why.

Nighty night stargazers.

Every time I go to bed and post on here that the weather in Lowestoft is terrible, it immediately clears up. My partner woke me up at 2:00am yesterday morning and told me she should could see stars through the bathroom window. Downstairs I went in my dressing gown and through the kitchen door I could see the Pleiades. Minutes later still in my dressing gown but now equipped with big bins I took my first glimpse of Comet 46P Wirtanen as it sailed past the Seven Sisters. It then got a bit silly as I tried to get a photo using my Dslr on a Poundland mini tripod balanced on a set of boxes placed on a chair in my kitchen 'lean to' with the door open. No more than one out of ten for scientific method. Well I did manage to get a 'snap' or two of the 'blurred kind'. Will post something in the near future. Nice view of the comet through my 11x80 bins. It has quite a big coma when I compared it with the nearby Pleiades.

Weather closed in again and I'm back in bed.

Weather has actually managed to deteriorate today. Didn't think this was possible but I was wrong!

Meteors and a bright comet up there but now I've returned from Berlin, what do I see before me .....?  Clouds.

I've looked at clouds from both sides now both up and down and still somehow it's clouds occlusions I recall I really can't see stars at all.

George in lyric mood, in bed and in Lowestoft.

Interesting fact I discovered yesterday - the Dadaist and Surrealist artist Max Ernst was a big fan of the German astronomer Wilhelm Tempel - comet discoverer extraordinaire.  Max produced a series of drawings and symbols which he labelled as 'illegal astronomies'. Bloke was absolutely barking, thought he had hatched from an egg laid by his mother. However, his artistic endeavours offer wonderful off world and alien landscapes. Creations no more strange than the false colour images we routinely capture. I also discovered that he  used state of the art 'wet photography' techniques to achieve his finished works. Sounds a bit familiar? What he might have achieved if Photoshop had been available will never be known!

Tonight In between the clouds I had my first go at Mars. Small but still bright and now above the houses at the rear of our house. Wobblin' about like a jellyfish in the surf, but having been inspired by Reggie and his excellent October Mars post, I thought I would give it a go whilst the Moon was out of the way.  Haven't processed the AVIs yet but fingers crossed I might have one recognisable image to post sometime soon. I also tried taking a few stills of Uranus hoping to capture some moons but the the combination of too much murk, light pollution and high ISO probably will have ensured noise overwhelmed signal. Weather tonight very mixed and out of sink with Metcheck forecast.

Nighty night all.

Had a very nice evening at Sheringham Park - the landscape architect Humphrey Repton's swan song in Norfolk. Our friends treated us to a son et lumiere in the woods. Now I know one man's son et lumiere is another astronomer's light pollution but I must say The National Trust did it wonderful well. Light levels reasonably low and lamps well located and mainly red enabling night sight to be, in the large part, maintained.  So much so that the North Norfolk dark skies put on their own show for the naked eye to see.  I counted at least 10 Pleiads, could not only see M31 but could discern it's disc like shape and the Cygnus rift dark against a very bright Milky Way and the double cluster were all very prominent. I had the best views ever of the constellation Hercules, even the dimmer stars were visible, so for the first time, I could see just how big a constellation it is. Usually I just see the keystone and the rest is lost to the background. Similarly, Ursa Minor was clearly visible as a mini 'Plough'. Great night out for an old man but unfortunately I did miss a couple of bright meteors as I was looking the wrong way.

As a consolation prize, I purchased a bag of chips from the chip van in the car park. Result!

George back home and tucked up in bed. Nighty night stargazers.

Changed my profile photo. At the weekend we attended a day long course at the London School of Mosaics. -  My effort - " Can you guess what it is yet"? -  A 'bright' comet with ion and dust tails plus three red and ancient stars.

Weather still very mixed and suddenly winter cold here on the coast. But on a positive note our Tai Chi DVD has dropped through our letterbox and I have ordered a digital vernier caliper from Amazon for £13-99. I really wish the delivery man from Hermes would dress the part. A golden helmet and winged feet would be excellent. I've always felt rather let down by our local 'Badger Builders' whose workman don't wear black and white striped safety helmets.

George waxing philosophical as the Moon wanes in Lowestoft.

Bright full moon - (big wink for Neil) - with lots of high level wispy cloud. A few big jets flying silently across my field of vision. All rather beautiful through my big bins.

George now in bed wondering when he might go 'imaging' again?

Yet another lovely autumnal day in Oulton Broad with cloud moving in as night falls. However, my partner on her daily walk took this lovely photograph of the sun heading for the horizon over the Broad.

Today I started building my 3d printer in kit form. Bewildering number of parts! Thank goodness they are well labelled. This will not be a fast process - after all I'm a 'simple country architect not an engineer Jim'! ? My partner is already getting twitchy with all the parts laid out in the 'clean room' or kitchen as she prefers to call it. Not sure how long she will be 'comfortable' with the kitchen table out of action?

George in his slumber chariot considering 3 dimensional possibilities.

Last night was beautiful in Lowestoft. Really clear night - all night.  On a plus side I set up to take some lights of M31 wide-style. On a negative side my NEQ6 Pro started to play up and in combination with the guiding software and my laptop turned all my stars into arcs. Got to bed at 5.30 am. pigged off!! ? BUT sitting out under the stars for five hours watching the Summer Constellations set in the west and Orion rising in the South East how can that be bad? M33 was really easy in my big bins and I think I spotted M1 with averted vision. Loads of Ms all round and the Garnet Star was big and red and beautiful. Not many meteors (saw three in five hours) but one was nicely spectacular. Have spent today in the backyard re-fitting my mount on its pillar - reduced the play on the central fixing -I also cleaned all the electrical contacts. Will probably reload PHD2 software before I go 'a guiding' again. When the stars come out tonight I shall realign on Polaris but I will give imaging a miss tonight cos I'm a really tired old man and according to Metcheck its going to rain here in the early hours of tomorrow morning.

I rarely photograph my 'refractor in action' but I did early this morning and it turns out it was the only image worth a look! ?

Been absolutely lovely all day here in Lowestoft. Nice now but looking at Metcheck and SAT24 it will be good and cloudy at 'midnight when the street lights go out'. So instead of doing a bit of imaging tonight, I shall be surfing the cosmos with my big bins and then it's full on sulking for me.

George a bit miffed in Lowestoft?

Have just about cleared a backlog of projects and ready to go on my 3D printer kit that I had for Christmas last year. Made a great 'connection' today, for some time I have been wondering how to combine my digital photographic and artistic/ block print making  interests. Well on line I found an article in 'Print Making Today' all about using 3D printers to make - printing plates!  Job done!?

Obtained a 'book recover', preowned in excellent condition, hardback version of Chris Hadfield's 'An astronaut's guide to life' for £1 from Poundland.?