Cloud dodging

[John]

A fair amount of lumpy clouds scudding across the sky tonight but the patches in between seemed very dark so I stuck my Vixen 4" ED refractor out with the ES 20mm 100 eyepiece on board to see what I could pick up in the gaps.

The sky quality between the clouds was confirmed as I could pick out the eastern part of the Veil Nebula without using a filter. With the O-III filter in place this object was phenomenal with several sections visible and the brighter east and west sections just squeezing into the 3 degree field that the big ES eyepiece gives in this scope.

Leaving the filter on I picked out nice views of the Lagoon, Triffid and Omega nebulae as they hugged my tree infested SW horizon. I also made a quick excursion over to Ursa Major to pick up the Owl Nebula, a well defined round spot of light.

Removing the filter and panning back towards the south west, the lovely and dense fan of tiny stars that is the Wild Duck cluster stood out in the field of view.

Panning towards the zenith, the old favorites the Ring and Dumbell Nebulae were very clear and bright. The Dumbell being the much larger object with this low magnification of course. I can see how the Ring nebula could be overlooked by those not familiar with it at just 33x.

A long swathe of the Milky Way was showing so the 4" was quite able to pick out some galaxies to add to the mix. The M31, M32 and M110 group were bright and contrasty with M31 extending well beyond the bounds of the 3 degree "porthole" on space that I was using. The sometimes elusive M33 glowed softly in Triangulum.

Back in the neighborhood of the Great Bear, my favourite galactic pair of M81 and M81 seemed bright and welcoming and I also picked out the much fainter NGC 3077 dimly just on the edge of the field.

Across the same constellation the Whirlpool galaxy M51 was relatively easy to spot with the smaller core of NGC 5195 right alongside.

I polished this short and opportunistic session off with a few minutes gazing at the richness of the double cluster the "Sword Handle" in Perseus. The finest open clusters in the sky for me.

The cloud clumps are still whisking overhead but there's been enough rents in them to be able to have a lot of fun with my smallest scope and that single but versatile eyepiece

[cotterless45]

Lovely report. It's been tough cloud hopping !

Try NGC7789 in Cassiopeia, you'll be pleasantly surprised under

clear skies,

Nick.

[John]

Thanks Nick - I'll add that one to my next session

[AlexB67]

Nice rep John, always good reading these threads because it supplies fresh food to add to my lists. One of the most interesting parts of the forum IMO for deeps sky lovers such as myself. I wish sometimes people wrote reports more often

Lovely report. It's been tough cloud hopping !

Try NGC7789 in Cassiopeia, you'll be pleasantly surprised under

clear skies,

Nick.

I love that whole area around there. The double cluster is among one my favourites, and dragonfly also if I recall, I only recently realised M103 is lurking in there too, it is on my list of TODOs now, I've yet to see it. I'll give NGC 7789 a whirl too now that you mention it, it is a pretty busy bit of sky around there

[AlexB67]

I had the little experience of cloud dodging last night. Skies were not great but intermittently some clarity. Still, a long session waiting for those gaps. I gazed some time around that Cassiopiea area and saw M103, and a nice collection of NGCs. All 3 NGCs NGC654,NGC663,NGC659 nicely fit in the view of a 25mm in my scope, it was a more interesting collection to look at compared to M103 in a way. I focussed onto that area at high Mag also to study it up close, impressive. Of course while I was there the double cluster also had to be seen, despite the conditions, this area always looks very rich in stars to make for good viewing.

Conditions were not great though, with high thin cloud as well frequently dimming views on and off. I a sure this bit of sky will be more impressive if the skies were anything like what they were like last Thursday. I also added a bit of salt and pepper in the form of M52, as well as visiting some golden oldies.