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.

A quick peep with Tal2

The sky last night was beautifully clear. 

So I decided to roll back the observatory roof and give Tal2 a bit of an airing.

Firstly Arcturus was spotted, the diffraction spikes around the star made for a mesmerising sight. I took a good long look at this most wonderful of stars.

My thoughts were so far away that I completely forgot about my initial target ..Mars!

Mars noticeably now has a slight case of the "shrinks", at least it does through the 9mm Orthoscopic eyepiece.

Surface detail was very low tonight on Barsoom.

It won't be long before my National Geographic Mars map is replaced with my Moon Map.

After a few more minutes of telescope observing I decided to close up the observatory, sit on the garden bench and take in the night sky without the help of visual aids.

All was quiet in the village, the streetlights had gone off, and the evening was mine to take in the starry night.

Sir Patrick Moore... you will be missed.

It was with much sadness on Sunday that I learnt of the passing of Sir Patrick Moore, CBE, FRS, FRAS.

Since the winter of 1976 Patrick Moore has been a constant companion on my astronomical journey.

I must have been about nine years old when I was first allowed to stay up late to watch the Sky at Night.

I was hooked from the first episode.

From the opening title music of Sibelius's At the Castle Gate...the simple studio props, the fascinating interviews, and especially the wonderful enthusiasm and eccentricity of Mr Moore, how could I not be hooked.

Often at the end of an episode Patrick would mention that a newsletter/factsheet was available.

To obtain this A4 information sheet,  you simply sent off a stamped addressed envelope to the BBC.

Whenever Patrick mentioned it was newsletter time, I couldn't get to a post box fast enough to send off my SAE.


Back in April of 2005 my wife, our son Jac and I were lucky enough to meet Patrick Moore, at his home in Selsey.

We could not have had a warmer welcome.

He gave me one of his books, which he signed, a gift I will always cherish.

It was a day I will never forget.

RIP Sir Patrick Moore.

For Patrick...

Early this morning Helen and I set out to capture a shot of Mercury, Venus and the crescent Moon.

This is the one of the shots that was taken. It was a beautiful morning, with frost on the ground.

Morning Star Mercury & Co, over Haverfordwest...

Early this morning I grabbed the Nikon D50, plus a small tripod and headed off for an astro adventure.

I decided to walk to the outskirts of our village to afford myself a better view of Mercury..

From our garden I have no chance of seeing Mercury if it's in the East; there are too many trees and especially too many houses barring any possible view...

After setting up the camera I was lucky enough to capture this image of all three planets.....  seconds later some passing clouds snuffed out Mercury's light.

Mercury-Venus-Saturn : 06h:49m 

I then moved to a better location, about 200 yards further along.....

Now I had an uninterrupted view towards the East.

The lights of Haverfordwest were twinkling in the distance.

Mercury was once again free of the clouds, and I witnessed a beautiful celestial display of all three planets.... plus my favourite named star... Zubenelgenubi.

Mercury-Zubenelgenubi-Venus-Saturn: 06h:56m UT

There were loads of clouds to the West, but luckily the East was fairly cloud free, at least in the parts of the sky that mattered to my observations....

Mercury over Haverfordwest  07:05 UT

Happy Mercury hunting....

Clear Skies

Mark