I thought tonight would be a fine night to observe, with a high pressure system parked over Nevada and central California. I'm right. I'm observing with my Ceravolo HD216 Mak-Newt. The air is allowing me to easily use my 4mm Zeiss Ortho and the 6mm Zeiss Ortho along with a Ultima 2X Barlow. Did a double star test to check the sky quality: easily split 7 Tauri (0.8 arc-sec, mag.6.5-6.7). It was only 50° up in the east.

The views of Saturn and Jupiter are some of the best I've seen all year from my location, here in Belmont. The air is still and clear and the temp is steady at 52°F. I've been watching Jupiter's belt activity and the GRS rounding the corner into view as I write. I see much detail within Jupiter's NEB and GRS. They exibit white ovals and oblique patches. The SSEB and NNEB are plainly visible with their slight irregularities. Using a Lumicon Deep Sky Filter on Jupiter is bringing out the detail and cutting the bright glare to hep with seeing the reddish-brown belt colors. Saturn shows the Cassini Division all the way around. I can see five moons. Even tiny Enceladeus (mag. 12) is visible just off Saturn's A Ring. I think I can intermittently see the Encke Minima in the A Ring at each ansae. I'm able to keep a sharp image of Saturn with 430x (6mm Zeiss Ortho and Ultima 2X Barlow). I don't get many nights like tonight, here in Belmont, near the endlessly movingmarine layer. Maybe I'll stay out all night.

Couldn't find the comet that was mentioned today in -TAC-, too much light pollution here to see mag. 10 fuzzy stuff.

Hope all of you have such a night as this tomorrow at Pacheco.