Clearest sky in weeks tonight

I guess most people are outside tonight. If the rest of the country is anything like Dublin....................

MAN O MAN.......................is it CLEAR!!!!!.

Gonna spend a while with Saturn later on. Thats one sexy planet.

Yep another great clear sky tonight, been out since 6.30pm, now 1.40am, with just a short break in the middle. Bagged myself a lot of objects, great night, and had a good viewing of Saturn at 333x magnification for about half an hour. Mars was still difficult to make out any real detail but at certain times saw hints of streaks of darker colour going through it. A 23A filter helped too, but this was most beneficial with Saturn, where it highlighted the ring shadow and some striped markings on the planet. Counted 4 and possibly 5 moons (possibly Dione, was just in front of the planet at the edge, so difficult to see)

Missed the best part of the night. Now complete cloud coverage..............

The skies here were some of the clearest and most transparent that I can remember in a long time. Towards the south, that streetlight is still out, thankfully, I was able to see the entire length of Canis Major, Lepus the Hare was stunning and I'm sure if I looked I might even have seen Columba. I was able to see that faint band of the Milky Way and I could only imagine what it would have looked like from a rural site.

Met Eireann are predicting another clear night tonight, so let's hope for a repeat of the same.

Yep, great skies the evening of the 10th here in Louth too. Set an all-time record, completing 5 sketches (8P/Tuttle, NGC1535, M42, NGC1999 and Mars) in a single evening.

See: An extraordinarily productive night sketching on CloudyNights.

Cheers,
-- Jeff.

Out already with the scope and determined to find holmes tonight