Stunning night , shared !

[cotterless45]

An email from a member of our local group and Paul asked to bring a couple of his scopes up to my garden and compare the view through my refractor. We had a few hours under quite dark skies with a lovely tour of top sights . The evening was sparkly clear as darkness fell. A low pass of the ISS and an iridium kicked off the session. Although not a deep sky gulper, a 6" frac manages fine,

Overhead, M51 showed both discs well defined.

Gemini.

M 35 showing the lovely chains and colours.

NGC 2392 The Eskimo Nebula, showed details of the halo at x220.

Draco.

NGC 6543 The Cat's Eye Nebula , again details of the blue green halo at higher magnification, looked really bright.

Hercules.

A sparkling M13.

Coma Bernices.

The tight bright globular M53 and a trip to M3.

The very bright core of M106 as bright as nearby M94 in CNv.

Bootes.

High in the east , Mu Bootis (Alkalurops) showed the delicate double A making this a lovely triple. Split at x200.

STF1910 showed lovely twins at x218 at 3.8".

Leo.

83 and tau Leonis, another "double double", two bright stars each with a dimmer companion. Showing parallel pairs.

STF1500 a fine 1.4" split on this binary.

Up to a rising Cygnus and Piazzi's Flying double, 61 Cygni and another "double double",

S786 and STF2789 at 10' apart at x48.

Then over to Lyra and some fine colour in

M57 The Ring Nebula. The third "double double " of the night , STF2470 and STF2474, showing two parallel pairs. A quick view of M27 in Vulpecula, just picked out the Dumbell from the glare of the rising Moon.

Delphinus showed NGC6905, the Blue Flash and then back to Cygnus for NGC 6826, the Blinking Planetary. Both were blinking good !

The whole evening was featuring return views to Jupiter, Mars and Saturn. Mars was very clear, colourful and detailed as it rose high to it's southern zenith. The ice cap, Hellas and Syrtis Major were very clear.

I 'd never seen Saturn so sharp and clear in Paul's OO 200 VXL. A testament to these great optics. Cassini and the planet's shadow on the wide rings being very clear. One big shock was being handed a 2" 28" Nirvana in the dark. I'd never seen such a huge kilo ep !

We had a good gaze around at the range of constellations , Hydra under Leo, the clear triangle of Leo Minor. Saturn sitting in Libra with some odd star names , Zubeneschamali and Zubenelgenubi and the wonderful bowl of Virgo with Mars. Yed prior and posterior showed the edge of Ophuichus, with Rasalhague topping. The Moon was coming up, just time to wish Paul a happy 60th birthday and blame me if his wife asked him why he was a tiny bit late !

Clear skies,

Nick.

Sent from my iPad

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

Great report of a glorious night out. Some lovely objects captured

[Pete Presland]

a very detailed report sounds like you had an excellent evening. i was out myself until around 1:30ish and it was lovely and clear with no wind either!

[John]

It's always fun observing together - sounds like you had a great time and picked some fine targets 

[TwoPi]

Fab report as ever, sounds like a great night.

I always find that you give me some new ideas; either things I'd forgotten about or things I never knew about!

Thanks for taking the time to share it.

[KevUU]

Awesome Nick sounds like a fun evening.