Esparto, 3/30

by Shneor Sherman

The good news is that the neighbor only had the barn lights on for about 10 minutes, from 8 p.m. The bad news is that the sky did not match the CSC forecast. Thin high clouds covered most of the sky most of the time. Nonetheless, the seeing was excellent, affording spectacular sharp views of Jupiter up to 437x in my 18" with considerable detail visible in several belts. I also enjoyed surprisingly good views of a couple of my favorite objects, the Peanut Nebula (N2371/2) in Gemini and Thor's Helmet (N2359). I did have some nice views in my 25x100s, but was generally disappointed. I cruised some galaxies in Leo, Coma and Virgo, but as the sky got worse at 10, I began packing. When I left at about 10:50, sky conditions had not improved. I'm losing confidence in CSC.

Gregg called me at 5 to let me know he was not coming.