When Saturn surprises....

[Victor Boesen]

First time observing with my dob from another place than my balcony so I took the advantage to take a look at Saturn, and boy I didn't regret it! Not that I haven't observed Saturn before but only with my old bird jones type telescope from my balcony, but if I wasn't kneeling down I would have been kicked to the ground by the views. The 3d like image with the subtle color differences on the planet itself and the cassini-division clear at 255x magnification and four of the moons visible at lower magnification I was completely shaken by the views!

On skysafari 5 I saw ISS was rising so I tried to chase it with my 24mm eyepiece and I could tell the shape of it while manually tracking it but as soon as I changed it out with the 14mm I could see the solar panels and the core of the station and I was sooo amazed by the fact that I was observing humans in space from the ground with my very own telescope!

I haven't had the scope out for a really long time so this was very nice even though mosquitoes were biting me all over the body, I was still very satisfied and excited for Mars next time... and the lunar eclipse of course;-)

Clear skies everyone!

[chiltonstar]

The ISS passed over close to Cygnus while I was looking at some doubles last night - I managed to track it manually with my 180 Mak on a SkyTee for 10 secs or so. As you say, utterly amazing the detail and the fact that it is manned (and womanned).

Chris