A brief viewing opportunity...

[Smithysteve]

Disappeared into the dome around 10.45pm for a couple of hours... ?

The moon was blazing away in a cloudless warm night. It was perceptively getting darker earlier, but the almost full moon shone so brightly and the sky was still backlit from the sunset, so my hopes at seeing faint fuzzies were low.

 

But I chose to ignore the moon altogether last night, it would have blinded me, even with filters, and I believe there would have not been much relief. So I went everywhere bar close to the moon ... And later on I could not get to it anyway...?

 

I could not get near to any major planets, so In no particular order...
Albireo, like two sparkling jewels, been meaning to return to this after reading other viewing reports. A lovely sight!
NGC 6712, glob, , , was due south at midnight, so added this to the tally.
M27, Dumbbell neb, Vulpecula , mag +7.6, just have to keep going back to this... Awesome!
M56, glob, Lyra, mag +7.6
M57, Ring neb, Lyra, mag +9.3, again, a favourite I keep going back to! And easy to locate...
M71, glob, Saggita, mag +9.0
M92, glob, Hercules, mag +6.1
M106, Spiral Galaxy, Canes Venatice, mag +8.39, very faint under the conditions...

 

M11, Wild duck cluster, Scutum, mag +5.8, and my first glance at this cluster reinforced the V shaped wild duck flying formation! It is 14' in diameter, about 1/3 the size of the full moon.. A lovely open cluster I am sure you will agree ?

 

M26, OC, Scutum, mag +9.3

Finished off with...
NGC 869 & NGC 884, Perseus double cluster, Gorgeous sight, first viewing this year, will be going back to this many more times I hope ?

 

I did look to see if M31 (M32, M110) were high enough to chance a look, but no, still a bit low, so maybe next time ?

 

That's it, thanks for reading ?
Cheers!

[Tweedledee]

Wasn't that brief then, you saw quite a lot of nice stuff. 

 

I too got M56 in 3D.