Night of the deep sky

[Buqibu]

Went out expecting some quick views of the planets Jupiter and Saturn, and maybe of The Moon later on. Seeing was not on my side this time. I don't know if it was the atmosphere, the heat from nerby buildings, humidity, poor transparancy etc...all I know is, the views were very wobbly. Couple that with the wind and I decided to switch my attention elsewhere. I thought I'd have a go at some deep sky objects, considering the moon wouldn't be out for another 2 hours or so. Quite a lot of stars visible (at least for urban skies, maps place it at bortle 5/6, but it really depends on neighbour lights). First object I went for was M15 (globular cluster), high in the sky, well placed for viewing. Got a bright blob of undefined stellar mass, about right for the 4 inch achro. I also took a look at M2 - same story, though M2 was lower in the sky. Considering it gave similar views at lower altitude, I'm assuming M2 is slightly more impressive than M15 in the same conditions. Both clusters took magnification well, though I could not clearly resolve stars. Next, I moved on to this naked eye double above Saturn - Algedi Secunda. Very nice, wide double of seemingly identical components, both barely fitting in the field of view. Kind of like a big version of Mesarthim in Ares. Next, I decided to try and find a new object. Noticed this nebula in SkySafari, well placed, high in the sky, bright as a planetary nebula can be, seemingly easy to find. "The Blue Snowball Nebula" (C22). I looked around the designated area of sky and found this bright pair of stars at 8mm. Though one of them had something odd about it...it wasn't focusing. The other star looked like a point, this one like a blueish white circle. Could this be it? It seemed too bright to me, I thought it would be far more of a challange. Decided to check SkySafari, and couldn't accurately match the surrounding stars in the app to my eyepiece view. Same thing in Stellarium. I was absolutely convinced this wasn't a normal star, so I looked online at an accuarate star chart , depicting even faint stars in that area. Found an image aaaaaandd...there it was. The nebula in the same position I saw it in the eyepiece. I was very pleased. Snaped a few pictures, blue colour clearly visible in them. I always imagined these objects to be out of reach to me, thinking only large telescopes and fancy cameras can present their beauty. But every passing night I am proven wrong. Of course you won't see hubble like images, you might not see big bright beautiful, colourful, detailed views, but there's something about them being real, right up there, as they've been for millions of years. As for the end, looked at The Andromeda Galaxy and the Double Cluster. By this time my hands were starting to go numb from the cold so I called it a night. Very memorable session😁.

(All observations were made with Celestron AstroMaster 102AZ, using a Celestron Zoom eyepiece).

 

[wookie1965]

One of my favourite objects is the "Blue Snowball" NGC 7662 I usually find it in my 25mm like you it just doesn't focus but up the mag a bit and the blue comes out brilliant object.

These 4" achro`s really punch above there weight I love mine.

Great report some fine objects there and thanks for posting.