by Rob MacKay
Last night I did my "astronomy day" duty by hosting a driveway star party for some of our friends and neighbors. Conditions were fantastic. Great clear skys and very pleasant temps.
It started off midafternoon with safe solar views through the C8 and people trying to count the large number of sunspots. I counted at least 10 different groups, more then I can ever remember seeing before. Anyone else do any solar viewing recently that can confirm this large number of sunspots?
During the evening I showed friends and neighbors views of the moon, planets and double stars through the FSQ106, while imaging the same targets through the C8 on a side by side setup, which provided for just as many ooo's and ahhh's. Some people were having their very first looks through a telescope and I ended up giving an impromtu astronomy lesson, explaining what a double star is and identifying the different Jovian moons. We even caught a shadow transit of Io!
A great time on 1st quarter moon evening.