Lost in galaxies !

[cotterless45]

A chance break in the weather and as soon as darkness fell, it was clear and darker than usual. Finishing with light cloud at 11.30 , I got into the Leo galaxies, Canes Venatici , Coma Berenices and into the bowl of Virgo. The galaxies looked quite amazing with 8" aperture , presenting different sizes and core brightness  . Even M97 ( owl nebula) showed up.

I dropped down to Hydra and the bright glowing NGC 3242 ,"ghost of Jupiter", before exploring the globular clusters M3, M53 and the faint NGC 5053. There was little time for binaries, but for brilliant colour ,"La Superba" was hard to beat . 

This is a wonderful time of year to drop from Denebola to Vindemiatrix, enjoy the mass of spring galaxies even from the edge of town, under clear skies !

Nick.

[Littleguy80]

Great report, Nick. Lost in galaxies is the right expression! Thoroughly enjoying galaxy season  

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

Lovely report. Brings back memories of my first trawl through the Coma/Virgo region with my home-made 6" F/8 Newt. I failed dismally to identify all I saw that evening, there were just so many. Only much later with my 8" SCT and tracking mount did I systematically hunt down and identify a lot of them. Even so, it is still just fun to move through the area taking it all in at your leisure.

[Eastman]

On ‎14‎-‎3‎-‎2018 at 13:09, cotterless45 said:

I got into the Leo galaxies, Canes Venatici , Coma Berenices and into the bowl of Virgo.

Great report Nick, Galaxy hopping