I started with the star, Sirius, because I wanted to say a final goodbye to it since I won't be able to see it in the evening again for a while. It was very bright and beautiful as it always, and it was twinkling wildly because of it lowness in the sky. This made it really neat to look at.
Next, I went to M35 in Gemini because I looked at it last time and I wanted to see it again because it was such a beautiful sight to see. I could see many beautiful stars in it and it was still very impressive the second time I've seen it. All the stars were easily visible and the cluster was very easy to find.
Next, I looked for more new targets. I started with the Spindle Galaxy (NGC3115) in Sextans. It was easily found but not very bright, it faint and fuzzy, not really showing any details, but It was a nice find anyway. I tried to zoom in with my 10mm eyepiece, but that didn't make it look any better as the seeing wasn't the best.
Next, since I was already in Sextans, I moved to
Next, I moved to another galaxy group, M95 and M96. This group was a little brighter than the last one, but I had some difficulty finding them because my finder scope was not very clear at the time and there were not very bright stars around them, I actually stumbled across by accident, but I'm glad I did. The pair was definitely worth finding, they didn't show much detail, but that was expected. I enjoyed looking at them, I stayed there for a couple minutes and moved slightly over to my next targets.
Next, since I was in the area, I moved to M105 and
Next, I moved to the trio of galaxies. M65 and M66, and
Next, I looked at
Next, I left the galaxies and went to Melotte 111 in
My final target was the star, Spica, in Virgo. Of course, I have seen this star before, but it has been a while since I last saw it in a telescope, so I wanted to look at it again, and I figured it would make a nice bright target to finish up on. It was very bright and impressive in the eyepiece, definitely worth looking at again.
That brings an end to my evening telescope session, but that is not the end of my sky watching for the night.
The following morning, I got up between 5:00 AM and 5:45 AM to look at the planetary alignment currently taking place. I have been waiting for clear skies to be able to see this event and finally got a chance to see it.
That was an impressive sight being able to see Jupiter, Venus, Mars, and Saturn all so close together in the sky at the same time. As I got a little farther in to viewing them, the Moon also joined in on the party. The Moon was very close to Jupiter and Venus, forming a triangle with them. I took a few pictures of the alignment and then I went back home as I had to walk a little distance down the road to be able to see them since I have a high treeline at my home. This was really nice to be able to see this rare event.
That concludes my report of my evening and morning of sky viewing. I hope you all enjoy reading as much as I enjoyed writing it.