I’m alive, well and still observing… I’m just not writing about it much. We’re halfway through the observing season and the weather in the UK hasn’t been helpful. I’ve still managed to clock some hours under the night sky, and I’m finding it useful to keep a record. Keeping track of observing data. In February last year I decided to start keeping track of my observing activities and the weather that sometimes kept me from doing so.

The morning of the solar eclipse and looking to the East it’s not a pretty picture. I can see the location of the Sun, which is a major advance on yesterday, but it’s not even bright enough to show up through the solar filter… not good. Optimism wins out, and I decide to set up the solar telescopes – white light and hydrogen alpha (Hα) – before having breakfast in the hope that luck will be with me today.

I’ve been wondering about this one recently. Observing is a generally solitary, dark, cold and occasionally damp experience in the UK, so why would you do it? The funny thing is that I look forward to observing sessions because of the fabulous objects I’ve put in my plans – and I have detailed plans. It’s the chance to make progress on those paper-bound ideas that makes me want to do it.

For those nights when you don’t want to spend an eternity tracking your target down it’s nice to have a plan that involves one of the brightest objects in the night sky. The Pleiades (M45) is handy for just this reason, and armed with a map and some doubles from the Washington Double Star catalogue (WDS) that’s what I decided to do on the night of the 6th January 2015.

It’s time for another open cluster, and in truth I’ve built myself a bit of a backlog. The issue is that I’m too lazy to scan my drawings in a timely fashion. That’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it. This time I’ve chosen to turn my telescope, with pencil in hand, on M103 (one of Charles Messier’s objects) in the constellation of Cassiopeia for the second time this season. The first was with my ST-80, but I felt that 44x magnification didn’t to it justice.

A couple of nights ago I got the chance to set my Vixen A80MF telescope up for a session under the stars. It’s been a while since I last used it, I’ve been using a newtonian and binoculars recently, but the it’s reminded me why I like refractors so much. This isn’t an instrument for wide field views normally, it’s my double star scope, but with a 16mm Skywatcher Nirvana eye piece (82 degree AFOV) the view of the double cluster was fantastic.

I’ve finally made a start on the open cluster observing programme I talked about in… February this year! It seemed sensible to start with an easy one because I was determined not just to observe and classify, but to produce a sketch too. The chosen target was Stephenson 1, which is also known as the Delta Lyra Cluster. As you’ve probably guessed, the delta Lyrae visual double – and many would say that is enough reason to take a look – plays a key role in the structure of this open cluster.

Charles Messier Charles Messier was born in 1730, in France, and grew up to be a comet obsessed astronomer working in Paris. To be fair to Messier, most 18th century astronomers were obsessed with comets since discovery could bring fame and riches. Whilst hunting for these bringers of wealth, Messier kept finding himself confounded by other objects that appear non-stellar, but lacked one of a comet’s defining features: they weren’t moving.

I managed to find this comet quite easily as a large fuzzy dot with my 10×50 binoculars on the 3rd August 2014 when it was south of eta Aurigae. Visually I couldn’t see a tail, but I’ve been informed that one appears on images. It was around magnitude 6–7, so quite bright, and it’s moving towards Perseus, fading as it goes. Here’s a chart (Carte du Ciel again) to help you find it (click on it for a larger view).

I’m chasing Messier objects with binoculars at the moment. To be honest most aren’t all that impressive, but whilst searching out these objects in Ophiuchus I encountered something fabulous. I found a huge cluster of bright stars with an obvious profusion of faint stars forming the background field. It immediately struck me that after a lean time on Messiers this object was what binoculars were made for. But I wasn’t done!