Early hours 9th April

[cotterless45]

Woke up at 12.30 and managed three hours . Got a wee bit chilly , but when the moon sank, the sky was darker (SQM 19.3) and seeing was above better.

Lovely to observe summer targets in relative darkness.

I used the old Vixen 102m f10. Gave pin sharp views and wonderful colour . Managed down to 1.3".

Hercules, M92 and M13 followed by the ring asterism "Webb's wreath" SAO 85678. A beautiful sparkling cluster. Eltanin at 2.1" gave an amazing view of its delicate unrelated companion.

δ Herculis (Sarin) gave a wee dot just out of the A star. For blue and red, try Rasalgethi.

Ophuichus was up and I found M10, M12 and M14 , almost dusty globular. Serpens gave M5. NGC 4672 in Ophuichus gave the " blue racquetball " planetary , real blue. This one really blinks !

Sky now reading 19.3 SQM.

Up to Cygnus and the very bright planetary NGC 7027 . To the packed star field and binaries that field the "blinking planetary ", really blinked at x40.

Much lower , a first sight this year of M11 in Scutum, just a few flying ducks.

A special lone star in Libra, HD140283 (SAO 159459 ) the oldest star ( possibly ) observable from here. " Methuselah star", plenty info , let's say it's incredibly old. Sits alone.

Just a shed full of binaries giving colour as Aquila cleared the roofs and I cleared off back to some sleep.

Worth a try to see targets often bleached by summer light, happy nights,

Clear skies ! Nick.

[Davesellars]

Great report!   I trust the light high clouds must of disappeared by that time in Derbyshire?

I've found it's often the case early morning around 2 to 3am that the air is considerably clearer and subsequently darker for it.  I still need Cygnus to rise a touch further up to clear some houses but looking forward to viewing this area again, as you say before the summer light gets us!

[wookie1965]

Fantastic Nick cannot wait for Hercules come up at a decent time some cracking objects there some I haven't seen so will be jotting them down thank you.