Waxing Gibbous Moon, a highly polished report!

[The Warthog]

I started observing once the Moon was just above my rooftop, at 133x. The first thing that caught my eye, after I had done a general sweep of the terminator and settled into my chair, was the elongated shape of Schiller (presumably named after the German shakespeare, but I'm not sure) It's not the biggest ting around the SW part of the Moon, but its shape is a grabber. Although it is 184 km around, it looks, er, well like a long ellipse. Along the axis pointing south wards are Rost, Scheiber and Blancanus, at about 40, 100, and 100km in diameter (my guess) and quite round looking.

Moving down through Mare Humorum we get the great Gassendi, with Gassendi A in its rim always a good marker if you're lost. Just south and east of Gassendi, you find a neat row of four craters, all in the 10 to 15km range, and one hanging a little below the rest. The easternmost of these is called Darney, and the westernmost Herigonius. The other two are lettered craters and I think they should name one after me. The one that's out of line is called Norman, which is my middle name, so I'm not surprised it's out of line. The line starts in the southern shores of Oceanus Procellarum, and ends on the western shore Mare Nubium, and crosses the south side of Mare Cognitum (known sea.)

Just to the north of Cognitum is a sort of lagoon which holds the landing site of Apollo 12 on its west side, and the landing site of Apollo 14 is just in the highlands to the east, and just north of Fra Mauro, which you really can't see at this time. It's just too shallow at this illumination. Cognitum is bounded to the west by Montes Riphaeus, named for a Greek mythical mountain range, and Euclides, named for a maker of very big dump trucks.

Big Copernicus is still worth a look at this illumination, and you can pick up Lansberg and Reinhold on the way - they are standouts with not much clutter around them. They curve aorund the east side of Mare Insularum (sea of islands) a small seaboounded on the west side by Kepler and the smaller Encke. Marius A looks like a pockmark on the huge Procellarum, and Marius is just beginning to break through the terminator.

The prize of the night for me, though, was Aristarchus, just free of the terminator, and deeply shadowed, but I could clearly see the top of the dark bands that mark the walls of this bright crater. That's a first for me.

I could finish off with Sinus Iridium and its associated craters and features, but I'm tired of writing. I saw an awful lot last night, and right now I have an appointment to keep with the Moon again. I have observed the Moon several times in this lunation, and this is the first time I've been able to take the time to write it up.

The Moon is a fascinating place, and for all it doesn't change, it never seems to stay the same. It's a target, not a source of light pollution!

[Astro Adj]

Thanks for the great report! I really enjoyed reading that, and it's made me want to step up my moon observation! I have the Virtual Moon Atlas and have begun to recognise certain features, still have a long way to go though.

I agree, the moon is wonderful to observe and although I can empathise with the DSO observers/imagers to whom it is a royal pain I just concentrate on the moon when it's there, and go DSO hunting when it's not!

[The Warthog]

Thsnks, Adrian!

[Jake Bullit]

Great report ,I am going to have to drag myself out there now after reading it.