Thursday Night Astronomy!

Dave North wrote:

Peggy, glad you enjoyed it, but this time of year at first quarter you should *start* with the moon rather than end. That goes for the next few nights at least.
Why?
It's wayyyy up in the sky and there's less atmospheric turbulence.

Gumby's looking up!

(For those who weren't at the SJAA meeting a few months ago: never mind, you had to be there.)

Seriously, the moon was great last night. The light was perfect for Rimae Hyginus and Triesnecker, and Ariadaeus (which started showing Wednesday night) was still visible for its full length. I could see all the rilles easily in my 6" reflector, and they were visible (even bits of Triesnecker) even in the 80mm f/7 refractor despite very unsteady seeing caused by all the wind (though I had to back off and wait a few times while the wind shook the telescopes). The Alpine Valley straddled the terminator, and the Caucasus were just off the terminator casting long spiky shadows.

Mars wasn't so good; I couldn't make out any dark areas at all, thought I saw a light area on the leading edge (i.e. the direction the planet was drifting) but when I fired up Guide that didn't seem to correspond to anything I should have been seeing, so perhaps it was just an artifact of being low on the horizon (I broke down around 10, too tired to stay out longer).