When I was 12 or 13 (a couple of decades ago, sniff), my parents bought me a 60mm refracting telescope - and one of my favourite things to view through it was Saturn. It always appeared as a bright blob with a discernable ring - but no moons, not even Titan, could be seen.
Well, tonight I was sitting down with some astronomy software (SkyVoyager) which I purchased for my new iPhone, and discovered that Saturn was in a prime position for viewing. So out came my relatively new 10" dob, with which (up until tonight) I'd seen Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune - but never Saturn.
Boy, what a thrill to see it through this scope! At 167x it was bright and very sharp at times - and larger than I expected it to be through the eyepiece. The rings, despite being almost on edge, were very clear. I could see five moons - Titan, Rhea, Tethys, Iapetus and Dione. At 278x the viewing started to suffer (fuzzy, hard to focus), due to some haze and the fact that I do most of my viewing from the balcony of an inner city apartment, so light pollution and smog are an issue.
My wife was in bed asleep while I was doing my observing, but I went and gently woke her to find out if she wanted to take a look at Saturn through the scope.
"What does it look like?", she asked.
"It looks like Saturn," I responded.
"Oh - well I don't want to look at it unless it's doing something awesome," she said.
It's more likeseveraldecades for me since I was 12 or 13, which is when I first looked through a telescope that a kind gentleman set up in the playground at school one night. My first view was Jupiter and I've never forgotten it.
The need to share these moments with someone like minded is why I overcame my shyness and joined the local Astro society (and this forum) and found a whole bunch of half brothers and sisters.
Matt,
Spot on, Saturn is truely a heavenly sight. When I first observed it with my 12" Dob, "awesome" was the correct description. I have just purchased a 2x TV Powermate and using it with my 12 Nag, Saturn is even more awesome, or is that awsomer?
When I had Saturn in my Celestron C8 for the first time I woke my wife at 3am and asked if she would like to come outside and check out Saturn to which she replied "why do I need to get up and look at Saturn when I can roll over and look at Uranus anytime" to which she promptly went back to sleep.
and joined the local Astro society (and this forum) and found a whole bunch of half brothers and sisters.
