Hawksmoor

3.00am BST - Just got back from Corton Cliffs and having some soup to warm up. Hoped, looking North out over the Sea, to glimpse a bit of auroral activity but reckon we kidded ourselves that there was a faint green band close to the horizon. Took some photos with a tripod mounted DSLR so after a little sleep I will go through them. Not hopeful

70 years old today and I remain unsure as to what I want to be when I grow up.

A few  rather beautiful rockets of the more terrestrial kind over Lowestoft tonight also a very pretty Jupiter Moon conjunction. Took  few stills with my Canon 600d and a zoom lens (f between 200 and 300mm). Messed about with the images to bring out Jupiter's moons Callisto and Ganymede. Io and Europa were lost in the glare from Jupiter. Our Moon was waxing gibbous with the terminator highlighting the 'Bay of Rainbows'. All very lovely and even a few clouds couldn't spoil the view.

A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Observing and Imaging Year to all at FLO and Stargazers every where. Thanks for all the help, likes, laughs and kind comments you have sent to me over the last 12 months. Mrs H has asked me to add her best wishes to you all.

A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all my friends on Stargazers Lounge from 'the old man next the sea' in Lowestoft.

A very Merry Christmas to all my chums on Stargazers Lounge around the world. Over the last couple of years, whilst Mrs. H and I have been prevented from travelling, Stargazers Lounge has provided opportunities for us to see images captured from locations around the UK and the wider world by imagers located in many different places. SGL has enabled a wider perspective for us 'lock down oldies' which we both value.

Many thanks to FLO for sponsoring this site and for the excellent mail order service. Dave Eagle's guide to Affinity Photo arrived yesterday, so I shall be  producing even more of my blurry  technicolor images in the New Year but from now on using a different workflow! A change is as good as a rest!🧐 (I chose this emoji because I thought it look like Sir Patrick.)

A very Merry Christmas to you all!

According to Metcheck there wont be a night I can  stargaze in Lowestoft until the 6th of November. Oh well they do say patience is a virtue!

According to Metcheck we are in for 102miles per hour winds this evening in Lowestoft, followed by three days of rain!  Only got snow left to go now! 

George bracing himself in Lowestoft next the sea!

According to th BBC weather site, the weather last night in Lowestoft should have been good to midnight. It started well so out came my mini imaging rig and off I go with some video clips of the Moon. Waxing fibrous so I thought I would go for a mosaic composite using my 90mm ETX at about F13.8.  All was going well until the clouds rolled in. They began to clear and high level ice crystals took over. Nice 40 degree ring around the Moon but as for the video clips, there on in - blurry.  Astronomy must be one of the coldest and most frustrating of all hobbies. I'm just too obstinate to give up. 

After an intensive week of gardening we had Sunday at leisure.  Carried out a partial water change , filter backwash and general clean up of our tropical fish tank. Then I took apart a pair of misaligned zoom binoculars from circa 1980's. An absolute treasure-trove of eight lenses in lens- cells and four prisms plus some bits for a DIY focuser.  This should  come in handy astro-shed- spectrum project wise. Happy but tired old bloke now drinking a lager and anticipating dinner. It is very cloudy in Lowestoft, so not much change there!

After searching through over 200 - 30 second light frames of a large tranche of the milky way, taken over two nights around maximum,  I found two far from dramatic potential Perseids. I must say I was amazed how many Iridium flashes and satellites I managed to capture. Low earth orbit must be like the M25 on a Friday afternoon.

After sorting out my shed I decided to treat myself to a bit of 'mini rig astro imaging' of Orion before the clear sky 'clouds up'.  Trouble is before the street lights go out at 11:30pm light pollution in Lowestoft is a big problem. No prizes for guessing what time the cloud is predicted to roll in overhead?

Amazing how many clouds can mysteriously appear out of a clear blue sky at the mere sniff of an eclipse!

Another clear night until  23.00 when according to Lowestoft BBC Weather "The Fog" will come rolling in off the sea by 'Spivey Point'.

Argh! I believe my Lenovo 'workhorse' laptop just died. 

George now irritable in Lowestoft.

Aurora over Lerwick spectacular tonight. Have been watching it via webcams1 and 3 at Shetland.org. 

Back home in Lowestoft tonight and I can see a few stars between the clouds. Good heavens!  

Back to normality - horizon to horizon cloud cover! - so murky. I'm struggling to see my neighbour's security lighting.

Bathonian fossils.

Beautiful night. Been out with bins and my 66mm Altair refractor. Not really dark this time of the year but warm as far as 2:00 in the morning goes in East Anglia. The Milky Way through Cygnus is a pretty thing and the view through 11x80 bins is breath taking. Hopefully I will have captured some widefield snaps in and around Sadr.

Hope the skies are clear for you wherever you are.

Night all you Stargazers.

Beautiful sunset and new Moon over Cambridgeshire tonight.

Been working on a homemade light box for capturing flats.

Brief window just after 18:00, before the cloud and whilst the Moon was still behind our neighbour's roof, during which I managed to see the comet through my 8x40mm bins. E3 sitting nicely in the triangle formed by the 'kids' in Auriga. Managed to capture a few widefield images of Auriga at f=18mm . Will process tomorrow if worth the time and effort. Lots of light pollution and sky plus small dim comet!

George in bed in Lowestoft

Cheered myself up by designing a permanent pier and removable cover.  My partner seems to have given it the tick in the box. Probably will start the build in the spring.