Spotted M51 (I think!)

[Gregnat73]

After many nights where the cloud has rolled in just as darkness falls, last night was finally beautifully clear so I got out the bins (Canon IS 15x50) for the first night of proper stargazing for a while!!

Being the lazy sort, I was observing from inside my flat which has views down to the horizon from East to South and limited views from the South to the West. I spent most of the time getting reacquainted with the constellations etc. Spent a bit of time on M2, M3, M13, M92 before trying for M51 and for the first time I think I actually spotted it. Starting at Alkaid and going down until I reached an obvious triangle of stars, there was definitely a bright patch just below it (especially with averted vision) Then I moved on to the old favourite M31 ( no problem spotting that one!) and a try at Neptune (think I got it as a very faint star) before spending the last half hour just gazing at the huge number of stars visible (despite the moderate LP) and looking for meteors (didn't spot any!)

All in all a great couple of hours - especially bagging M51 (there's just something about galaxies... As a Star Wars fan it's amazing to think that those smudges of light really are "a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away!!") hopefully tonight will be the same and I can try a proper dark sky site!!