I started off by looking at the majestic planet, Saturn. This planet is always a stunning sight to see with the brilliant rings around it and as always, it didn't fail to impress me. It was just as beautiful as ever. I used my barlow set to 2x and my 10mm eyepiece to get the best view of it. It was definitely a good place to start off the night. I could the brightest moons of the planet off to the sides of it as well.
Next, since I was the area, I decided to look at the Saturn Nebula (
Next, I decided to revisit a target from my last session in Scutum, the Wild Duck Cluster (M11). This star cluster has a lot of dim stars in it that are pretty close together. In the 10mm eyepiece, it was a very beautiful sight to see. Dozens of stars were visible and it was quite a sight. I'm glad I came back to it, it was definitely worth a second look. I will probably be remembering that one for a repeat target later.
Next, I went to the globular cluster,
Next, I went down to the star cluster
Next, I moved to the near by cluster
Next, I moved to the Little
Next, I moved to the Dumbbell Nebula (M27) in Vulpecula. This one was hard to point at being so high in the sky, but it was an impressive sight once I found it. It does have an appearance of a Dumbbell in some ways that I could see as well, so the name is accurate. It was a decent sized fuzzy patch with some shape to it. It was definitely worth looking at.
Next, I went over to Lyra, and looked at the bright star Vega, one of the brightest stars in the north. It was a very bright and beautiful
Next, the reason I went over to Lyra, the Double Double star. The two pairs of stars were easily seperated from each other as pairs, but the individual pairs were much harder to split, in the 10mm eyepiece, I could just barely tell that they were two seperate stars. I used the barlow set to 2.5x and the 10mm to split the stars better, which made it much easier to identify them as two seperate stars. They were pretty nice to look at, and a good test for vision sharpness.
Next, since I was already in Lyra, I decided to look at the Ring Nebula (M57). This one was not very bright, but was easily spotted. It had a clearly distinguishable ring shape as the name implies. It was a pretty sight to see in the 10mm eyepiece. I might come back to this one again.
Next, I went to the Owl Cluster (
This next one is the one I was anticipating all night. The brilliant planet, Jupiter. Jupiter is at its closest distance to us in over 70 years, so I knew I had to get a look at it, and it was definitely worth the time I spent staring at it in amazement. I used my barlow set at 2.5x and the 10mm eyepiece. This produced a view that was truly amazing to look at. Jupiter appeared very large in the view, and the cloud bands on the planet were easily visible with good clarity. It was an unforgettable moment seeing it like that. The four galliean moons Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto were also visible in the view, with three of them close to the planet and one of them much farther away. This was the most impressive sighting of the night by far.
Next, I moved to the planet Neptune, which is nearby Jupiter in the sky right now. It appeared as a starlike point, not really showing a disc or anything.
There was nothing special to see there, so I went back to Jupiter. This time my mom came out to look at Jupiter with me, and then my sister came out to look at it later on. They were both impressed by the view as well, and both pointed out the cloudbands and the moons around it. We all had fun on that one.
That brings an end to my report, I had fun out there last night, except for the mosquitos, but oh well, it was worth it. I hope you enjoyed reading my report as much as I enjoyed seeing all those sights out last night. It was nice.
