Some good fishing, M45 and some more.

[AlexB67]

Good skies here last night in Bristol and the alarm clock was in action. It was a little cloudy on the eastern side so I started with M27, sky appeared clear there, best views I've had of it so far, then the sky cleared bit by bit. I turned to M33, not that there was a huge deal to see, but do I notice as the nights get darker and it gets higher up it shows a little more clearly.

Further up all three of M110, M32, M31 were visible, M110 with averted vision switched on and off occasionally, but it was there. The size of M31 was as big as I've seen it to date.

Later on now. My new targets, M45 appeared above the house form further back in my garden. What a sight it was, in the 25mm 2.3 FOV it was like an Xmas tree lit up. A whole new portion of sky began to open up thanks to some useful gaps in my garden M36, M37 and M38 were spotted also for the first time, ( they're are going to be very nice clusters once they are a bit higher up in the sky I feel ), but they were already impressive, so I looked at then for quite some time.

A bit later, this is the reason I really got to the crazy hour, Jupiter appeared, I was desperate for my first gaze of it. Even though still quite low in the sky, at 108x and 81x it was nothing short of spectacular, the first time I've seen it, so I would be excited . The moons clearly visible and two very discernible bands with a touch of slight colour. Adding the Barlow to double the mag added nothing in terms of seeing extra detail, as I was expecting pretty much considering it was still low in the sky. I finished up with a quick look at M35 also to see if I could find it, but then the wee hours of the early morning light began to appear.

A great catch of fish for me and some new Messiers.

Who'd think before I ever started this hobby that a 130 pounds bit of scope can bring this much pleasure. I don't ever recall buying something for that small money that brought so much goodness

[Scooot]

Thanks for writing. Time flies when you're having fun. Night fishing and astronomy sounds like it goes well. Presumably you've found a good spot to do both with few trees etc blocking your view?