Nice Detail: Yerkes, Cleomedes, Macrobius

[cloudsweeper]

5.30pm Friday (sky quite light initially), 8SE Cat with reducer, Moon waxing crescent, high in the south, aligned on it.

Moon nicely framed, with Mare Crisium a great feature - x41, 73.  Cleomedes above it, mostly lit.

x128 - M. Crisium: craterlets, hills, and a "ridge" which is the western edge of the shallow crater Yerkes.  Craterlets and hills also in Cleomedes, plus the overlapping larger pair of craters in the northern floor.

x213 - those overlapping craterlets were clearer, with shadows to their SW rims.  The jagged eastern wall of Cleomedes showed up better with the play of slender shadows.

x256 - M. Crisium was a large part of the FOV, very nice.  View still stable.  Most of the very low eastern edge of Yerkes became evident.  West of M. Crisium lay Macrobius, mostly lit, with central peak, and a craterlet (mostly in shadow) right on the northern rim, the whole resembling a ring with a small dark jewel.  Lovely.

x320 - still good - the small hills and their shadows in Cleomedes stood out more, as did some wall detail in the larger of the two overlapping craterlets.

x427 - quite good, although 'scope wobble became a nuisance!

Finished after an hour for a meal.  A very pleasing lunar session.  What a delight the Moon is!

Doug.