Spring Equinox sights

[Special K]

We got out of our son's concert and waiting by the stage door were treated to a fine sight of the Moon and Jupiter about 3.5 degrees apart. At home it was possible to squeeze them into the ED80/31mm combo for voila five moons!  Io and Europa just pulled away from each other enough to split. Close enough to be very interesting too.  There was a milky glow in the air which a relatively full moon likes to exploit and only the brightest stars were visible. 

Arcturus is a rich orange in the 80mm, much more than the 152mm achro. Looking at the chart there are some interesting things within a hop away.  Amazing the amount of exploring you can still do within just a few degrees!

1 degree S is Napoleon's Hat!  (Picot 1)  Funny little asterism that I suppose kind of does look a bit like it.

1 degree N is a pleasing double Σ1825 easily split at 85x. The companion is dim but far enough apart in the average seeing to be possible.  

1 degree N, 2 degrees W of Σ1825 is Σ1804, a 9th magnitude star with a faint little companion to the NNE, barely discernible in this milk and avg seeing. 

Mizar Σ1744 The Daytime Double was another easy thing to find given the conditions and I was pleasantly reminded it has a close double in addition to Alcor.

Jupiter looked fairly decent at 171x and is due south around 11pm making it a sociable hour!  I'm thinking it best to get in as much viewing on this as we are just past opposition and it will be lower and lower in the sky in the weeks and months to come. 

Clear skies and happy Equinox!

[Piero]

Nice report Kevin!  I enjoyed reading it!

[FenlandPaul]

Nice report, Kevin.  The moon and Jupiter together was a lovely sight, wasn't it?  My wife called out to me as she took the boys up for a bath and there were whoops of joy from both the little monkeys as they saw the pair framed nicely by the landing window.  So after putting them to bed I got the scope out for a while and Jupiter looked wonderful - GRS bang on centre with a salmon hue and some nice detail visible in the belts.  

Paul

[laudropb]

Very nice report. A most enjoyable read.

[cotterless45]

Neat report mate, you got Tegmine yet ? 

Nick.

[Special K]

1 hour ago, cotterless45 said:

Neat report mate, you got Tegmine yet ? 

Nick.

Ha ha, no not yet!  I have no excuses really, although the big glass is back with the manufacturer to sort out the focus which didn't seem quite right.