G day Ian and others,
i woke at 3 yesterday but some welcome rain was falling. woke again this morning and could see some stars between fast moving cloud so bumped across the paddocks and up the hill (for the best eastern views) with the 8".
rewarded with some spectacular back lit clouds and glimpses of Venus and Luna dramatically framed by cloud edges. in gaps i managed to see comet Catalina (just a fuzzy patch in the poor seeing), Mars and Jupiter and 3 moons.
i have had my weeties and waiting to watch Sol rise over the sea.
clear skies are but a memory, some decent cloud gaps are good
L
just reading that yesterday Akatsuki space craft (on the second attempt) achieved orbit insertion at Venus
http://www.planetary.org/blogs/guest...agamihara.html