Except for cleardarksky.com, forecasts were very good. But clouds started showing up while I was setting up and it got worse from there. The plan was to observe galaxies in Leo and Virgo, but I quickly gave up because of the clouds passing over all the time and switched to the binoculars.


Observations (dobs):

  • NGC 3628 (Hamburger Galaxy) - could not stack


Observations (12x70 binoculars):

  • Starting from Dubhe - Ursa Major:

    • M81 (Bode’s Galaxy), Ursa Major - very faint

    • Could locate but not see M82

  • Starting from Alkaid - Ursa Major:

    • Could locate but not see M51

  • Starting from Arcturus - Bootes:

    • M3 (Globular cluster) - Canes Venatici

  • Starting from Diadem - Coma Berenices (found by intersecting lines Arcturus-Murphid and Vindemiatrix-Minelauva)

    • M53 (Globular Cluster) - Coma Berenices - even fainter than M81

  • Starting from Cor Caroli - Canes Venatici

    • Could locate but not see M94

  • Easily split Mizar / Alcor - Ursa Major 

  • Starting from Chertan - Leo

    • Could locate but not see Leo Triplet