Summer pickings, surprising targets.

[cotterless45]

Kicked off after 10. The crescent Moon was sinking in the west and even up to 1 it didn't get properly dark.

Mars was difficult at x266, but showed the ice cap and darker zones. A cross the southern sky a brighter Saturn and moons showed more promise. At x50 the Cassini was sharp at x150-266 there were signs of darker areas outside of this and a clean shadow to the rear . Several darker areas of the surface were spotted.

The some real surprises,

NGC 7027 a really bright gem of a planetary nebula . This is half way down the back of Cygnus and a stunning 8.5 magnitude. Another fainter to the boundary of Cepheus was NGC 7008, with a double to the edge of the view at x50.

IC 4756 showed a lovely bowl open cluster, then I crossed over to a stunning NGC 6633. Both clusters in Serpens and worth finding. Then some real surprises in the light sky,

NGC 6503 at x50 a really bright spiral galaxy and a better

NGC 5866 a brighter lenticular galaxy was bright side on and a lovely view off set from a V of stars at x50. I checked on seeing,

M51 showed both 'halves and M82 was bright. Then over to

"The little W" asterism in Draco at 18h35.0m. +72 25'' , a little Cassiopeia at x50.

Comet K1 Panstarrs high under UMa. Picked out as a fuzz at x50, but a better fuzzy view at x80, but not higher.

At 12.45 a really bright and high view of the ISS , missing Aquila and down to the horizon ended the evening.

These are bright, low power targets caught from the edge of town on a light night. Have a shot, under

Clear skies, Nick.

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

Lovely report of a great session. Some really nice targets there. NGC 5866 is sometimes referred to as M102

[estwing]

Nice one Nick even without proper dark skies there's treasure to be found

[YKSE]

Nice report Nick, shall get my scope out for these summer gems when it's clear.

[Charlie_starz]

I can't wait for the cloud to clear here.

Been three days since we got our telescope setup and the seeing here is still very poor. Tonight we got to see a very fuzzy crescent moon through a thinner part of the clouds but really it was just to test the finder scope. My son loved it as it's the first viewing through a proper size scope, but the cloud cover here is not set to clear until Thursday evening.

We will be joining in the observing then, and you have given us a nice list of targets to plan for. 

Until then we will continue to get to grips with the EQ 3-2 mount and play with stellarium.