Hi Everyone
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Yesterday night was a nice clear night and so i decided to observe.
Telescope-130mm reflecter
I saw the march obserserving challenge and thought i'd try and observe some of the objects.
Eta Carinae Nebula- A truly amazing nebula which spanned basically all the field of view in my 25mm plosoll (36x).There is a big Central dark lane that bisects the nebula in 2 parts and then there are many other dark lanes spidering of the main 1.On the bright eastern section of the nebula there is a bright orange star embedded in the gas(i was not sure if this was Eta).I could see a lot of stars around the nebula.And finding it was the easiest thing in the world
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Unfortunatly i did not observe any of the other march observing challenge objects.But....
Mars- Using the 10mm and 2x barlow(180x) i was able to see only the polar cap outline with a dark rim.It was quite small so i couldn't see any other detail and it was beginning to become a little bit blurry.i did a very basic sketch (attached) showing the polar cap.sorry about the quality of the detail but thats all i could see
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Saturn- At 180x magnification was of
Reasonable size to see some considerable detail.I could see the ring as a line going straight through saturn,unfortunately i couldn't see the cassini division which i haven't seen yet.I saw a brightish dot to the right of saturn which i presume was Titan and i also saw a fainter dot to the left(don't know what moon it was).
I tried to find the eight burst nebula again and failed again(how small is this thing?).I also tried to find the leo triplet and failed.Well it was getting late and i decided to pack up.it was an enjoyable night being out there with the stars again
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Thanks for reading
Orestis