Dreaming of Barsoom's Clouds

June 4th 2014  - 21h 30m UT  - Schmidt C8 Celestron x220 - A:III

Outside observing tonight at 10h 20m BST. Still not quiet dark, plenty of fast moving clouds, though with enough gaps to have a decent look at Mars, Arcturus, the Moon and Jupiter.

Mars is now noticeably much smaller, though the north polar cap is still evident and bright.

A white misty patch in the seven oclock position..... I wonder if it's a dust cloud formation?.

"CLOUDS!  imagine that   :0) .... yes maybe its a cloud bank"  my mind started wandering at this point....BARSOOM !!!

Jupiter next ..... washed out and watery, hovering as it did over Gilberts' house.

There have been many times when the neighbouring roof tops have thrown my planetary viewing into turmoil, tonight was one of them. Poor old Jupiter had an attack of the wobbles.

This year I have managed my fair share of sketches of Jupiter, so I can't really complain about this evenings wobbly Jovian dance..

It's by now 11.30pm and a cool breeze whispers its arrival.... I need to grab a jumper and wooly hat! .......maybe it's time to pack up Schmidt, and head back into the warmth of the house.

Tonight I spent about an hour circling Arcturus, Mars and Jupiter...  the time flew by quickly ...though I did  spend a fair bit of that hour Dreaming of Barsoom..

Haiku time......

the clouds of Barsoom
high above the martian soil
glinting in sunlight.


Clear Skies

Mark....

Chasing Mercury's Rainbow.

This evening I traveled down to Newgale. 

Though I had to wait about half an hour for the clouds to clear off.

In that time I had the car park to myself, not a soul around, only the gentle breaking of the waves to keep me company. 

The sea was calm, the darkening sky was mottled with slow moving dense black cloud, a perfect setting to contemplate the Cosmos.

Finally the clouds gave way to the denim sky - I spotted  Mercury hanging ghost like way out to the North West, towards St David's.

I trained the Schmidt onto this tiny spot of light.

My 20mm Erfle eyepiece revealed a small shivering mass of rainbow colours...  no phase was detected.  

Time to try my luck with the 9mm Ortho.

The 9mm eyepiece revealed even prettier rainbow colours, red, yellow and a lovely greeny blue...but still no phase detected.

Really I was pushing my luck as the planet was very low down on the horizon, but given the low altitude I hadn't realised detecting the planet's phase would be so difficult.

The little Schmidt had tried it's best, but Mercury had other ideas. At one point I thought I detected a slightly gibbous phase, though I reckon this was wishful thinking on my part!

After about ten minutes of observing, the clouds were back...  time to pack away the telescope.

Even though tonight's session was cut short, it was well worth the effort to get out and about in the county.