Anyone had a look at Mars yet?

As the heading says...I had a look through my C8 at about 10pm last night, Mars is now so bright, but there was a lot of turbulence since it was still low down in the eastern sky, still got to see some dark features, and the south polar cap through some fleeting steady air, Mars still looked a bit small though, but I was only peering at it at mag x100.

Here's the naked eye view close to the Pleiades...This will be great all winter!
Keith.

www.irishastronomy.org/user_resources/fi...Pleiades%2008.10.jpg

I had a look last night in the castle grounds, there was alot of turbulance, I saw it better 2 weeks ago, but a nice object all the same.

Thank you David for the look at Mars and for the Ring Nebula in particular, I really enjoyed observing under the shadow of the great Leviathen! A real treat

Deirdre Kelleghan
Cassini Saturn Outreach

No problem Deirdre,
I was really surprised at how the sky cleared and stayed clear :shock:
and I'd like to thank Phil Lardner for the amazing views through the big 20 inch Dob and allowing me to experiment with some of the eyepieces.

and I'd like to thank Phil Lardner for the amazing views through the big 20 inch Dob and allowing me to experiment with some of the eyepieces.

That is one nice scope. I got my first good view of the Veil through it on Saturday night using a UHC filter. Thanks again Phil.

Cheers,
~Al

...but there was a lot of turbulence since it was still low down in the eastern sky...

I know this isn't an observing schedule that'll appeal to everybody, but IMHO the best time to observe Mars at the moment is early morning, between 2.00 and 6.00. If you can drag yourself out of bed (or stay up that long!), you'll be rewarded with views of Mars at or above 45 degrees altitude, which should place it nice and high above the worst of the low-altitude turbulence and give reasonably good seeing. I've done this shift a few times already this year, and I'm actually getting significantly better views of the planet than I did in 2003.

On a related topic, I'm trying to get my hands on a suitable planetary filter or filters for viewing Mars, e.g. a #25 Red or a #21 Orange eye-piece. I went hunting for these at the WSP last weekend, but as vendors were pretty thin on the ground this year, I didn't have any luck. If anyone has filters of these types or similar to sell, send me a PM.