It was a touch milky in areas with some very light high cloud about and we still only have astro-twilight level of darkness starting at around 11:20 which is when I set up with the 4" refractor on the Alt/Az mount...
The Moon was just coming up, but before it could spoil what darkness was was aI got round to some
After I'd aligned my finder on Arcturus, I veered a touch to the side to find M3 nearby - A nice bright glob to start the night.
M13 really showed very nicely with the 10mm Delos showing some good detail and resolution of the cluster.
At 12ish the
my main target for the evening was the Veil nebula in Cygnus... It's been many years since I last observed this, although the conditions were far from ideal, but it was worth a go... The Western Veil was only very subtle and a took a while for my eyes to really pick anything out, however going over to the Eastern Veil, this was much more apparent with a touch of detail of it with "hook" at the bottom. I went from the 17.3mm Delos to a 32mm Baader Plossl and also a cheap 25mm Plossl with the Astronomik OIII and also switched for the Baader OIII which had a narrower bandwith pass... I felt the Astronomik was more suitable for this
After the Veil, I took a look at M11 - The Wild Duck Cluster. Always has been a favourite of mine and this was resolved well with the 5mm Pentax XW although with no doubt would be much better with the Moon out of play as some of the lower magnitude stars look like they had been washed out by the sky brightness that was ever more apparent. While in the area, moved down to the nearby globular cluster
A look now over to M31 and this was nicely shown along with M32 then shooting over to the Double Cluster which is a wonderful sight, whatever the Moonlight level.
The Moon now rising, along with Saturn just about rising sufficiently above a tree to be seen, however it was now 1:30 and time to see the
Then, Saturn - Also a long time since I'd last seen this and my Wife also stayed out to view this as she loves viewing the planets (as long as it's not freezing cold outside...). Despite still quite low down the air was reasonably stable and I was easily able to use the 7mm Pentax with a 2.2(ish)x Barlow for approx. 3.2mm and 225x magnification. The rings were wonderful and sharp with 3 of its Moons easily visible. I thought I could just about make out subtle difference in the planet surface. I packed up around 2:15am, very happy with the session and it just now starting to get a little chilly. Jupiter was still just too low down covered by a neighbour's large bush. I plan to make a an early morning session to view this soon (perhaps tonight!).
