Southern clusters. Neat challenges.

[cotterless45]

It's all gone dark ! Must be energy saving mode !

 

Clear night with curious seeing , lot of twinkling stars in some areas. Tried iota Cassiopeiae as a tester , it just glued itself together. On the other hand Tegmine split and iota Cancri showed beautiful colour . Even caught the other winter Albireo , h3945 in Canis Major . Along with M41.

Monoceros gave the magnificent beta and the more delicate and challenging 15 Mon, bright star at the  base of the "Christmas tree "(NGC 2264).

Really surprised to get down low in the south to Puppis. Picked up a spectacularly bright M47 , worth finding and an adjacent faint M46.

M50 in Monoceros looked like a dog with a long neck ! Also caught M48 in Hydra and a very low M93.

Some real beastly challenges for a 4" frac.

53 UMa (Alula australis) caught at x182. Now opened to 2", lovely bright near twin pair.

65 UMa at x150, just a delightful triple, really pleased to pick this up.

Sigma 2 UMa at x150. Lovely delicate visual double .

57 UMa at x180, just a glimpse of the very delicate companion.

Had a shot at some "trending "carbon stars, "Hinds crimson" being a good deep red start . BL Orionis was orange and bright.As was W Orionis. Brightest orange was UU Aurigae. Both X Cancri and S Cephei were bright.

Sight of the night was M47 , lovely views and not bad from a rescued Helios 102 f10, under 

Clear skies ! Nick.

[johnfosteruk]

Great report Nick, nice to see a rescue scope getting good use

 

[wookie1965]

Great report wish I could pick up those kind of bargains. 

[andrew63]

Spectacular stuff Nick. NGC 2362 is a lovely sight too, just below ' Winter Albireo '. It looks like a star and turns  globular like before your eyes !

 

andrew